HUNTING HORIZONS - Worldwide Hunting Seasons Database

The King Eider [Somateria spectabilis] is a large sea duck, which breeds along northern hemisphere Arctic coasts of northeast Europe, North America and Asia.
King Eiders migrate long distances in immense flocks; they are highly gregarious and congregate during spring migration beginning in April arriving on breeding areas by mid-June. Wintering flocks on suitable coastal waters sometimes exceed 100,000.
LENGTH: maximum of 60 cm WEIGHT: 1200-2100 gm WINGSPAN: 94 cm
MALE: The male is a striking bird with a mostly black back and wings, white breast and throat, light grey head and pale emerald green cheeks, the forehead, crown, and nape are pearl blue; the bill deep orange, with a large orange-yellow knob at the base.
FEMALE: Females are uniformly chestnut brown with darker bars, and are distinguishable from other female eiders only by the shape of their bills, which have a comparatively short base are olive or yellowish-grey and lack the knob.
JUVENILE: The plumage of immature males is a mixture of brown and white.
HABITAT: They spend most of the year in coastal marine ecosystems at high latitudes, and migrate to breed on the ground by shores of lakes or rivers of the Arctic coasts and on the Arctic islands, nests are occasionally found on the Arctic tundra in June and July. They winter in arctic and subarctic marine environments, most notably in the Bering Sea, the west coast of Greenland, eastern Canada and northern Norway.
FEEDING: This species dives for crustaceans, worms, and molluscs forming as much as 50% of their diet, with mussels being a favoured food.
CALL: On the water, it's mostly the male that makes sounds, including a soft dovelike urrr-urrr-urrr. Females make various growls in flight and growls and grunts on the water when disturbed or threatened. The drake's call is a deep cooing.
FLIGHT: Their wings whistle in flight.