The fulvous whistling duck or fulvous tree duck (Dendrocygna bicolor ) is a species of whistling duck that breeds across the world's tropical regions in much of Mexico and South America, the West Indies, the southern United States, sub-Saharan Africa and the Indian subcontinent. It has plumage that is mainly reddish brown, long legs and a long grey bill, and shows a distinctive white band across its black tail in flight. Like other members of its ancient lineage, it has a whistling call which is given in flight or on the ground. Its preferred habitat consists of wetlands with plentiful vegetation, including shallow lakes and paddy fields.The nest, built from plant material and unlined, is placed among dense vegetation or in a tree hole. The typical clutch is around ten whitish eggs. The breeding adults, which pair for life, take turns to incubate, and the eggs hatch in 24–29 days. The downy grey ducklings leave the nest within a day or so of hatching, but the parents continue to protect them until they fledge around nine weeks later.
The fulvous whistling duck feeds in wetlands by day or night on seeds and other parts of plants. It is sometimes regarded as a pest of rice cultivation, and is also shot for food in parts of its range. Despite hunting, poisoning by pesticides and natural predation by mammals, birds, and reptiles, the large numbers and huge range of this duck mean that it is classified as least concern by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
The fulvous whistling duck is 45–53 cm (18–21 in) long; the male weighs 748–1,050 g (26.4–37.0 oz), and the female averages marginally lighter at 712–1,000 g (25.1–35.3 oz). The wingspan ranges from 85 to 93 cm.
It is a long-legged duck, mainly different shades of brown; head, neck and breast are particularly rich buff (fulvous) with a darker back. The mantle is more darker shade of brown with buff-tipped feathers, the flight feathers and tail are dark brown, and a dark brown to black stripe runs through the center of the crown down the back of the neck to the base of the mantle. It has whitish stripes on its flanks, a long grey bill and grey legs. In flight, the wings are brown above and black below, with no white markings, and a white crescent on the rump contrasts with the black tail. All plumages are fairly similar, but the female is slightly smaller and duller-plumaged than the male. The juvenile has paler underparts, and appears generally duller, especially on the flanks. There is a complete wing moult after breeding, and birds then seek the cover of dense wetland vegetation while they are flightless. Body feathers may be moulted throughout the year; each feather is replaced only once annually.
These are noisy birds with a clear whistling kee-wee-ooo call given on the ground or in flight, frequently heard at night. Quarrelling birds also have a harsh repeated kee. In flight, the beating wings produce a dull sound. The calls of males and females show differences in structure and an acoustic analysis on 59 captive birds demonstrated 100% accuracy in sexing when compared with molecular methods.
Adult birds in Asia can be confused with the similar lesser whistling duck, which is smaller, has a blackish crown and lacks an obvious dark stripe down the back of the neck. Juvenile fulvous whistling ducks are very like young lesser whistling ducks, but the crown colour is still a distinction. Juvenile comb ducks are bulkier than whistling ducks and have a dark cap to the head. In South America and Africa, juvenile white-faced whistling ducks are separable from fulvous by their dark crowns, barred flanks and chestnut breasts.
The fulvous whistling duck has a very large range extending across four continents. It breeds in lowland South America from northern Argentina to Colombia and then up to the southern US and the West Indies. It is found in a broad belt across sub-Saharan Africa and down the east of the continent to South Africa and Madagascar. The Indian subcontinent is the Asian stronghold. It undertakes seasonal movements in response to the availability of water and food. African birds move southwards in the southern summer to breed and return north in the winter, and Asian populations are highly nomadic due to the variability of rainfall. This species has strong colonising tendencies, having expanded its range in Mexico, the US and the West Indies in recent decades with northerly range expansions into California in late 19th century and rice-growing regions of the U.S. Gulf Coastal Plain in the early to mid-20th century, given its affinity for rice-growing areas. Breeding in the northern American region is restricted to the Gulf Coastal Plain of Texas and Louisiana and localities in southern California and south- and east-central Florida. Observations of the bird outside the nesting season, especially since the 1950s have been recorded in temperate regions as far north as the Mississippi River Basin, eastern Great Lakes region, and along the Pacific and Atlantic Coasts right up to southern Canada. Wandering birds can turn up far beyond the normal range, sometimes staying to nest, as in Morocco, Peru and Hawaii.
The fulvous whistling duck is found in lowland marshes and swamps in open, rice fields, flat country, and it avoids wooded areas. It is not normally a mountain species, breeding in Venezuela, for example, only up 300 m (980 ft), but the single Peruvian breeding record was at 4,080 m (13,390 ft).
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