Blue-winged Teal, Spatula discors
Blue-winged Teal, Spatula discors, Male and Male and Female. Birds Photographed within the San José del Cabo estuary, Baja California Sur, March 2013. Photographs courtesy of Carol Snow, Del Mar, California.
Blue-winged Teal, Spatula discors, Male, Female and Male and Female. Birds photographed in the greater Mexico City area, March 2021. Photographs and identification courtesy of Marina Sutormina, Stockholm, Sweden.
Blue-winged Teal, Spatula discors, Male. Bird photographed in the greater Cozumel area, Quintana Roo, March 2021. Photograph and identification courtesy of Marina Sutormina, Stockholm, Sweden.
Blue-winged Teal, Spatula discors, Eclipse Plummage. Photograph taken in rural Baynorillo, Sonora, October 2021. Photograph and identification courtesy of David F Smith, Alamos, Sonora.
Background and Identification
The Blue-winged Teal, Spatula discors, is a dabbling duck and a member of the Anatidae Family of Duck, Geese and Waterfowl, which has one hundred seventy-four members placed in fifty-three genera, and one of ten global species of the Spatula Genus. They are known in Mexico as Cerceta Aliazul.
The Blue-winged Teal is mid-sized in stature, with an average length of 40 cm (16 inches). The sexes are slightly dimorphic but strongly dichromatic. This means that males and females are similar in size, but exhibit very different colored plumage. They have a large chalky blue patch on their upperwing, brightest in males. Breeding males have a grayish head with a large white crescent in front of the eye bordering the base of the bill, and cinnamon-buffy underparts densely spotted with black. Their speculum is green and the blue wing patch with a bright white border which is visible only when wings are out-stretched. Their legs have a rounded white border on their rear flank, and orange legs and feet. The female body plumage is mottled brown with a whitish patch at the base of the bill with a dark line through the eye, a small whitish crescent above and below the eye, and grayish to yellow legs and feet. The male bill is black, whereas the female’s has a bluish tinge. Females have yellow legs and feet with dusky pink webs. Both sexes have a dark brown iris.
Habitat and Geographical Range
The Blue-winged Teal is found in shallow freshwater bodies that have an abundance of invertebrates. They consume a wide variety of aquatic insects, algae, aquatic plants, seeds, and on occasion grains from crops. Their nests are subject to very high levels of mammalian predation.
They are common in the north-central United States and prairie Canada. In Mexico, the Blue-winged Teal is a winter visitor, with the males preceding the females, and found throughout the country except the northwest corner of Sonora at elevations below 2,200 m (7,200 feet).
Common Misidentifications
The male Blue-winged Teal is easy to identify, but the females are easily confused with the Cinnamon Teal, Spatula cyanoptera. This species is less patterned and has a warmer coloration pattern. Cinnamon teals also have a plain face and longer bill. The female Green-winged Teal, Anas crecca, also appears similar to female Blue-winged Teals but they are smaller in stature and lack the blue patch on the upper wing.
Conservation Perspective
From a conservation perspective the Blue-winged Teal is currently considered to be of Least Concern with stable, widely distributed populations. They are not heavily pursued by hunters due to their size, but their long-term survival is dependent upon the retention of their wetland breeding territories.