Schnozzles

When I see shoveler ducks I always think schnozzles. Maybe alliteration has something to do with it but they do have very prominent bills/noses. There was a man in my home village who was known as Schnozzle. As a child I just thought that was his name. I now know that it was because he had a large nose like American singer, pianist, comedian and actor Jimmy Durante who was popular from 1920s to the 1970s. Jimmy Durante gave himself the nickname Schnozzle from the Yiddish slang word "schnoz" meaning big nose. Shoveler ducks have huge spatulate bills which are equipped with well-developed lamellae – small, comb-like structures on the edge of the bill that act like sieves, allowing the birds to skim crustaceans and plankton from the water's surface.