Eider Duck (Fuligula Mollissima), Volume 3, Plate 246

Likely painted in May 1833, near Eastport, Maine.

Audubon relishes the dramatic power of the story told in this plate: a mated pair of eiders is approached by a single male and proceed to beat him back. The aggressor turned victim is using his wings in defense, creating a powerful image that also conveys scientifically important information, such as the color of this bird’s underwing. Note how the slanted ground and the vegetation in the background all seem to be leaning in the direction of the intruder, who desperately tries to maintain his balance in this slipping, sliding world. The plate’s subtle play with parallels and contrasts derives its energy from the center of the composition: the empty space between the bills of the three agitated animals that almost seem to touch.

From John James Audubon’s Ornithological Biography

The care which the mother takes of her young for two or three weeks, cannot be exceeded. She leads them gently in a close flock in shallow waters, where, by diving, they procure food, and at times, when the young are fatigued, and at some distance from the shore, she sinks her body in the water, and receives them on her back, where they remain several minutes. At the approach of their merciless enemy, the Black-backed Gull, the mother beats the water with her wings, as if intending to raise the spray around her, and on her uttering a peculiar sound, the young dive in all directions, while she endeavours to entice the marauder to follow her, by feigning lameness, or she leaps out of the water and attacks her enemy, often so vigorously, that, exhausted and disappointed, he is glad to fly off, on which she alights near the rocks, among which she expects to find her brood, and calls them to her side. Now and then I saw two females which had formed an attachment to each other, as if for the purpose of more effectually contributing to the safety of their young, and it was very seldom that I saw these prudent mothers assailed by the gull.