It winters in wide variety of freshwater habitats including marshes, ponds, lakes, rivers, and canals. Females are mottled brown all over with slim, tan head, long neck and a shorter tail. The adult northern pintail male has a brown head, white breast, and a gray body, with a long, curved border on the neck where the brown meets the white. Diet. It winters in wide-variety of freshwater habitats including marshes, ponds, lakes, rivers and canals. In the winter, the Northern Pintail often feeds in grain fields. It … The Northern Pintail’s breeding habitat is open unwooded wetlands, such as wet grassland, lakesides or tundra. Elegant Northern Pintails swim through wetlands and lakes with their slender necks and long, pointed tails held high. Diet The northern pintail duck dabbles for food in the water. Populations appear to fluctuate with drought, decreasing during drought years, and recovering in wetter years. During duck season, hunters spend lots of money on hunting licenses, sporting goods and travel arrangements to towns that live near the migration flyways, and add a … Habitat Northern pintail ducks nest in open country with shallow, seasonal wetlands and low vegetation. The Science: As a template for the integration of habitat and harvest management, we have developed a continental population model for northern pintails.This model links population level responses at the continental level, including harvest potential, to habitat management at the local level by articulating density-dependent relationships at the regional level. Feeds on seeds and aquatic insects.

As a result, the prairies are where the fate of the pintail population is largely determined each year. Fewer young are produced in years when large numbers of pintails settle in northern breeding areas. People refer to four species in the genus by this name, including the White-Cheeked, Yellow-Billed, Eaton’s, and Northern Pintail. Feeds on seeds and aquatic insects. Range and Habitat of the Northern Pintail The Northern pintail occurs across a very large range in North America, breeding all the way north to Alaska and Canada in the summer and migrating as far south as South America in the winter (NatureServe 2019). These eager breeders head to the prairie pothole region of the Great Plains, as well as Canada, and Alaska to nest as soon as the ice breaks up. From 2012–2016, hunters took on average 521,607 Northern Pintail per year. The breeding distribution of the Northern Pintail is circumpolar. Northern Pintail are one of the most sought after ducks by duck hunters throughout their habitat. Slim and long-necked, it has an elegant appearance both on the water and in flight. Farming has also affected nesting habitat. The northern pintail's breeding habitat is open unwooded wetlands, such as wet grassland, lakesides or tundra. Pintails are wary at all seasons, and become very secretive during the flightless stage of their molt in late summer. Pintails appear to be responding to new conservation practices, however, including habitat restoration and tighter restrictions on hunting, and numbers seem to … Northern Pintail (Anas acuta) Conservation Status Review ... Broad-scale or diverse (general) habitat(s) or other abiotic and/or biotic factors are used or required by the species but some key requirements are scarce in the generalized range of the species within the area of interest.

The Northern Pintail, an elegant duck with its trim form and swift flight, has been dubbed ‘the greyhound of the air’. Changing Agricultural Practices and Habitat Loss. Pintail, any of four species of sleek, long-tailed, long-necked dabbling ducks of the genus Anas (family Anatidae).

Several State Wildlife Grant Projects (T2-9-R, T-18-R, T-27-HM) have contributed to habitat enhancement of wetlands for Northern Pintail and other wetland dependent birds. This species also breeds in northern Europe and Asia. The under tail coverts are black, and the upper tail coverts are long and tapered to a “pin tail.” The flanks are creamy buff. During the breeding season, the male ducks have a brown head, a black bill, and a white chest and neck.

The Northern Pintail’s breeding habitat is open unwooded wetlands, such as wet grassland, lakesides or tundra. In the spring of 2000, the breeding population was estimated to be 2.9 million birds which was 48% below the NAWMP goal and 33% below the long-term average.