Comments: Eats various plants and animals, depending on availability. Feeds on seeds and nutlets of aquatic plants (sedges, grasses, pondweeds, smartweeds); also eats mollusks, crabs, minnows, worms, fairy shrimp, and aquatic insects. Animal foods important to females during prelaying and laying periods. Diet of juveniles includes mostly insects (Suchy and Anderson 1987). Dabbles for food; may also feed on waste grain in fields and marine animals on tidal flats.