This species inhabits large, open freshwater bodies like lakes, reservoirs, large ponds with grassy margins, or water treatment plants (Richardson 1990, Jennings 2010, Aspinall and Porter 2011). It is seldom found on densely vegetated wetlands (Jennings 2010). In winter, it occasionally occupies saltwater habitats like sheltered coastal harbours (Richardson 1990, Jennings 2010). During migration, it may also occur on islands and even in arid desert (Jennings 2010). There is no information available about its diet in the UAE; elsewhere it is omnivorous, although its diet consists primarily of vegetable matter such as algae, the vegetative pasts of aquatic and terrestrial plants, the seeds of waterweeds, sedges, water-lilies, grasses and cereal crops, clubmoss Selaginella and aquatic fungi (del Hoyo et al. 1996, Taylor and van Perlo 1998). Animal matter in its diet includes molluscs, adult and larval insects, worms, leeches, shrimps, spiders, small fish, fish eggs, frogs, birds and bird eggs, and small mammals (Urban et al. 1986, del Hoyo et al. 1996, Taylor and van Perlo 1998). It may feed in flocks on land, especially when winds cause high waves on water (del Hoyo et al. 1996). The species is diurnally active and roosts at sunset solitarily or in flocks (Taylor and van Perlo 1998). The breeding season in Arabia lasts from May to June and clutches may contain around six eggs (Jennings 2010). There is nothing known about its nests in Arabia; elsewhere it is a platform of vegetation that may be resting on the bottom of shallow water, floating or on a foundation of trampled plant matter in emergent vegetation (del Hoyo et al. 1996).