A smaller diving duck that can obtain food in deep water if necessary. The male has a purplish-black, iridescent head, yellow eyes, black back and breast, and a vertical white wedge on the sides. The female is brown with a white eye ring. Both male and female have a crown that comes to a point in profile, gray bills with a distinctive light ring at the base and tip, and a chestnut neck ring that is usually difficult to observe. Ring-necked ducks breed in the northern U.S. and Canada. Traveling in small, loose flocks of about a dozen, they winter in the lakes, ponds, rivers, and bays of the southern U.S.
Diet
Omnivores feeding on insects and plant matter
Activity Pattern
Diurnal (Active during day)