The Labrador duck, sometimes known as the pied duck or sand shoal duck, was a species of sea duck that went extinct in the 1800s. It was the first North American bird species to go extinct; the last duck was seen in New York in the 1870s. The duck was rare even before it went extinct, and because of this, we have little information about the duck and why it may have disappeared.

Male Labrador ducks were black and white with white wings, and females were mostly gray. The ducks’ bills were almost as long as their heads, and they had a refined beak shape—a wide, flat tip— that was tailored for a strict diet of mollusks. The Labrador duck was unique among North American ducks in that its breeding range was confined to the North Atlantic regions of Canada, although it wintered as far south as New York and New Jersey. No other North American duck breeds exclusively in this area, as all others that breed in the North Atlantic breed in other locales as well. Having a narrow breeding and wintering ranges likely made the Labrador duck more vulnerable to changes in its habitat than other ducks.

There are various theories for why these sea ducks may have gone extinct. While they were killed and sold in New York and Baltimore markets for their meat, they were poorly regarded for taste. Overhunting alone cannot explain the ducks’ extinction, but overharvest of the birds and their eggs in breeding grounds might have been a contributing factor. They were also hunted for feathers. In addition, the birds may have struggled to find food in the winter; mussel and shellfish populations declined as a result of human population growth on the coast, leading to less food for the ducks during the winter months.

Fifty-five old specimens of the Labrador duck are preserved today in museums around the world. Even though our information about the species is incomplete, the extinction of this beautiful duck can serve as a reminder of how delicate our ecosystems are.