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The northern shoveler (Anas clypeata), or northern shoveller in British English, sometimes known simply as the shoveller, is a common and widespread duck. It breeds in northern areas of Europe and Asia and across most of North America, wintering insouthern Europe, Africa, the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, and Central, and northern South America. It is a rare vagrant to Australia. In North America, it breeds along the southern edge of Hudson Bay and west of this body of water, and as far south as the Great Lakes west to Colorado, Nevada, and Oregon.
The Northern shoveler is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds(AEWA) applies. The conservation status of this bird is Least Concern.
This species was described by Linnaeus in his Systema naturae in 1758 under its current scientific name. Usually placed in Anas like most dabbling ducks, it stands well apart from such species as the mallard and together with the other shovelers and their relatives forms a "blue-winged" group that may warrant separation as genus Spatula.
No living subspecies are accepted today. Fossil bones of a very similar duck have been found in Early Pleistocene deposits at Dursunlu,Turkey. It is unresolved, however, how these birds were related to the northern shoveler of today; i.e., whether the differences noted were due to being a related species or paleosubspecies, or attributable to individual variation
Northern shovelers feed by dabbling for plant food, often by swinging its bill from side to side and using the bill to strain food from the water. They use their highly specialized bill (from which their name is derived) to forage for aquatic invertebrates – a carnivorous diet. Their wide-flat bill is equipped with well-developed lamellae – small, comb-like structures on the edge of the bill that act like sieves, allowing the birds to skim crustaceans and plankton from the water's surface. This adaptation, more specialized in shovelers, gives them an advantage over other puddle ducks, with which they do not have to compete for food resources during most of the year. Thus, mud-bottomed marshes rich in invertebrate life are their habitat of choices.
The shoveler prefers to nest in grassy areas away from open water. Their nest is a shallow depression on the ground, lined with plant material and down. Hens typically lay about nine eggs. The drakes are very territorial during breeding season and will defend their territory and partners from competing males. Drakes also engage in elaborate courtship behaviors, both on the water and in the air; it is not uncommon for a dozen or more males to pursue a single hen. Despite their stout appearance, shovelers are nimble fliers.
This is a fairly quiet species. The male has a clunking call, whereas the female has a Mallard-like quack.
Photos Nicosia,Athalassa, 6/2/2015 by George Konstantinou
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