BLIJEWING, according to some naturalists, a genus of a natidts, which has been named eyanopteras (by a sort of Greek translation of the English name), but more generally regarded as a mere section or subsection of the restricted but still large genus anaa. See Ducx. The tail-feathers are only 14 in number, instead of 16, as in the common duck, teal. etc.; but the character from which the name is derived is, after till, that which chiefly distinguishes the bluewings, and never fails to arrest attention. The best known species, the common or Innate 13. (anas or eyanopterus discorm), is generally called the blue-winged teal in the United States of America, where it isvery abutalant. 'Vast num bers spend the winter in the extensive marshes near the mouths of the Mississippi, to which they congregate both from the north and from the coast regions of the east ; hut the summer migrations of the species extend as far n. as the 57th parallel, and it is plentiful on the Saskatchewan in the breeding season. It breeds, however, also in the marshes of the solidi, even in Texas; and is common in Jamaica.where it ;ssuppo.sed to be not a mere bird of passage, but a permanent resident. None of the duck tribe is in higher esteem fur the table, and it has therefore been suggested that the B i3 particularly worthy of domestication, of which it seems to be very easily susceptible. In size it is rather huger
than the common teal; in the summer plumage of the male, the upper part of the head Is black, the other parts of the head are of a deep purplish blue, except a half-moou shaped patch of.pure white eye; the prevalent color of the rest of the plum age on the upper parts is brown mixed and glossed with green, except that the wing; exhibit various shades of blue, the lesser wing-coverts being of a rich ultramarine blue, with an almost metallic luster; the lower Varts are reddish orange spotted with black; the tail is brown, its feathers short and pointed.—Tbe B. is a bird of extremely rapid and well-sustained flight. The flocks of the 13. are sometimes so numerous and so closely crowded together on the muddy marshes near New Orleans, that Audubon mentions hav ing seen 8-1 killed by the simultaneous discharge of the two barrels of a double-barreled gun.—There are other species of B., also American; but this alone seems to visit the more northern regions.