A mallard is a type of wild duck found across North America, Europe, and Asia. You can spot male mallards by their brilliant green heads, yellow bills, and distinctive white neck rings. Female mallards look completely different: they're mottled brown all over, which helps them blend in while sitting on their nests.

Mallards are the most common wild ducks in the world, living near ponds, lakes, rivers, and even city parks. They're dabbling ducks, meaning they tip forward in the water to feed on plants and insects just below the surface, their tail feathers sticking straight up while their heads are underwater.

If you've ever fed ducks at a pond, you've almost certainly fed mallards. They're also the ancestors of most domestic ducks: people bred mallards over thousands of years to create the white ducks you might see on farms today. In autumn, mallards migrate south in large flocks, sometimes flying hundreds of miles to find warmer water. The loud “quack” sound most people associate with ducks? That's the call of a female mallard. Males make a softer, raspier sound that barely sounds like a quack at all.