Labrador Duck

Male Labrador Duck at the Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago.

1 records

 

The Honorable Daniel Webster, of Boston, sent me a fine pair killed by himself, on the Vineyard Islands, on the coast of Massachusetts, from which I made the drawing for the plate before you.

– John James Audubon

When Audubon set out to paint every bird species of North America, he used Daniel Webster’s specimens for his Labrador Duck plate. The species had already become rare by the time European settlers arrived in the new world, so very little about its history in Massachusetts is known. Observers from colonial times often referenced a “Pied Duck”, which could have referred to this species but that name was also used to describe other sea ducks. The last know sighting occurred in 1878 in Elmira, NY.

For more reading about the Labrador Duck in the state see:

Edward Howe Forbush’s A history of the game birds, wild-fowl and shore birds of Massachusetts.

The Labrador Duck:–a Revised List of the Extant Specimens in North America with Some Historical Notes by William Dutcher.