The cinnamon teal (Spatula cyanoptera) is a species of duck found in western North and South America. It is a small dabbling duck, with bright reddish plumage on the male and duller brown plumage on the female. It lives in marshes and ponds, and feeds mostly on plants.
Description
The adult male has a cinnamon-red head and body with a brown back, a red eye and a dark bill. The adult female has a mottled brown body, a pale brown head, brown eyes and a grey bill and is very similar in appearance to a female blue-winged teal; however, its overall color is richer, the lores, eye line, and eye ring are less distinct. Its bill is longer and more spatulate. Male juvenile resembles a female cinnamon or blue-winged teal but their eyes are red. They have 2 adult molts per year and a third molt in their first year. Cinnamon teal generally select new mates each year. They are migratory and most winter in northern South America and the Caribbean, generally not migrating as far as the blue-winged teal. Some winter in California and southwestern Arizona.
Behavior
Cinnamon teal are dabbling ducks, taking most of their food at or near the surface of a body of water; a breeding population studied in Arizona ate primarily seeds (especially Carex sp.), aquatic fly larvae, and snails. They mainly eat plants; their diet may also include molluscs and aquatic insects. They can also feed like northern shovelers, following each other in tight groups as they slowly feed across an area.
Each clutch of consists of 4 to 16 creamy white colored eggs, measuring 4.4–5 cm (1.7–2 in) in length and 3.33–3.5 cm (1.3–1.4 in) in width.
Taxonomy
They are known to interbreed with blue-winged teals,
- S. c. tropica (Snyder & Lumsden, 1951) tropical cinnamon teal occurs in the Cauca Valley and Magdalena Valley in Colombia.