Rabbits and hares are in season from November 1 to February 1.
Venison is in market from August 1 to January 1 only, and is good during that time.
Antelope may be generally had through the autumn and winter months.
Wild pigeons appear in the spring and autumn, but no longer in such immense numbers as formerly. It is only possible to obtain them for market when their “nestings” are near a railroad, which facilitates their quick shipment. The young birds (wild squabs), taken from the nest, make a most delicious broil.
Wild ducks, swan, geese, and brant are in season from September 1 to May 1. The choicest of these are: canvas-back, mallard, teal, red-head, widgeon, wood, brant, cygnet or young swan, goose when young and fat.
English pheasants, English hares, and Scotch grouse are to be found in the New York markets in excellent condition during the winter months.
The wild mongrel goose, which appears in our markets about Christmas-time, is, like the canvas-back duck, considered as one of the greatest luxuries, and exclusively American.
The far-famed canvas-back duck is also an exclusively North American species. Closely resembling in appearance and habits the red-head of America and the pochard of Europe, it is still quite distinct from and superior to both these species in the excellence of its flesh. It is found throughout North America, from the Arctic Ocean to Central America, on the interior waters and on both shores. Chesapeake Bay is the most noted ground for canvas-back ducks in the country, but they are especially abundant in Southern California. They breed on the ponds, rivers, and lakes, from Oregon to the more extreme northern portions of the continent. The canvas-back is without doubt the most sought after and widely known of all our ducks, and in localities where it can obtain the root of the Vallisneria spiralis (called by some tape-grass, and by others, incorrectly, wild celery), the food to which it owes the peculiarly delicate flavor for which it is so famous. As a highly prized delicacy, it stands without a rival. When, however, it is obliged to content itself with a diet chiefly of animal food, or is not properly handled in the kitchen, it becomes merely a very ordinary table bird. The Vallisneria is not found on the Pacific Coast, but in many parts of the interior, and especially in the Chesapeake Bay. The canvas-back being an excellent and strong diver, brings from the bottom the Vallisneria by the roots; these it bites off and swallows, while the red-head, black-head, and other ducks feed on the refuse grass, or occasionally a root snatched from the canvas-back. At times the water is covered with grass thus pulled up. By the middle of December the canvas-back becomes so fat as to have been known to burst open in the breast in falling on the water. In New Orleans it is called “canard cheval.” The canvas-back is covered somewhat like the red-head, but there is no reason for the confusion which exists in the minds of so many people regarding the two species. A careful comparison of the following descriptions of the two birds will indicate well-marked differences by which they may always be distinguished. The cook of a Buffalo gentleman, when asked if she knew the difference between a red-head and a canvas-back replied, “To be sure! one has the head of a fool!” (meaning the canvas-back).
CANVAS-BACK.
Feathers of the head short and smooth. Male with head and neck of deep chestnut color, the former sometimes quite blackish. Fore parts of body, wings and tail, black, under parts white; back and sides whitish, waved with black, but the white predominates, and the black lines are faint and much broken up. Female everywhere duller in color than the male.