While We Were Out

After the Mallard drakes abandon their mates to the job of raising the young, they fly to a secluded area and undergo their annual molt. The molting of their wing feathers leaves them temporarily flightless. They are no longer displaying their courtship plumage, but a drab "eclipse" plumage is similar to that of a female. It provides better camouflage against predators while their wing feathers grow back. The entire process takes 2 to 3 weeks. The hens go through a similar molt once their ducklings have fledged.

Mallards molt, a process in which their feathers are shed and replaced, twice a year. Juvenile males reach sexual maturity and begin molting into the bright plumage of the adult male as early as September. In June or July, adult male mallards lose their colorful breeding plumage and return to the brown coloring of the female. This is called the "eclipse plumage." Male mallards replace their head feathers first, which provides them with better camouflage. For about a month, when the birds' wing feathers are being replaced, they are unable to fly. By August or September, the males once again molt into their bright breeding plumage.