Duck Trivia

✔ Not all ducks quack. Muscovies make hissing and whistling sounds.

✔ Ducks can be half-awake. A duck can sleep with one eye open and the other shut. One hemisphere of the bird’s brain sleeps while the other one (controlling that open eye) remains alert and watchful.

✔ A duck can fly up to 60 miles per hour. Normal cruising speed is about

20 to 30 miles per hour.

✔ Ducks can live 15 to 20 years. But most duck lives are cut short, either

killed by predators or slaughtered for meat.

✔ A flock of ducks goes by other names. A group of ducks is also known

as a raft, a paddling, a flush and a team.

✔ Pigments and surface structure give feathers their range of colors. Pigments called melanins, for example, produce shades of black and brown, while carotenoids create bright red, yellow and orange. Pure white feathers have no pigment. Pigments can mingle to produce other feather colors, too.

✔ Birds manufacture some pigments internally; they obtain others from

the flowers, roots, seeds and fruits they eat.

✔ The external structure of the feather also affects its color. Blue is produced entirely through structural effects. Pigments and structural effects together can result in a color, for instance, yellow pigment combined with blue structural color produces green, one of the more complex feather colors. Iridescent sheens result when minuscule surface patterns on the feathers interfere with the absorption or reflection of light waves.