The introduction of European rabbits by guano miners at the end of the 19th century brought the bird to the brink of extinction in 1912, with twelve surviving individuals.

The ducks also will dabble and filter feed along lake shallows, shore, and in upland vegetation for macroinvertebrates, algae, leaves, and seeds.

[4] During the day, and especially in the breeding season, they prefer to hide among the grass and shrub vegetation, helping them to avoid avian predators such as frigatebirds.

The decline of the Laysan duck began between AD 400 and 1000, with the colonization of the Hawaiian Islands by Polynesians and associated non-native mammalian predators.

Like many isolated island species, the Laysan duck evolved in an environment lacking mammalian predators, and is ill-suited to defend itself against non-native ground hunters, such as humans, rats, pigs, and small Asian mongooses.

However, devastation of the island's vegetation by introduced domestic rabbits brought the duck to the brink of extinction in 1912, with an all-time low population of seven adults and five juveniles.

[7] It is also said by the Fish and Wildlife when they returned to eliminate the last of the rabbits that there was just one Laysan duck hen that still existed on the Island on a nest with broken eggs in it.

After many domestic rabbits starved and the remaining ones were eradicated by biologists in 1923, the ducks began to recover, increasing to a population of about 500 individuals by the 1950s.

However, population bottlenecks occurred, such as the severe 1993 El Niño drought and food shortage, which reduced the number of ducks to about 100.

The creation of a second population, since disaster is unlikely to strike both atolls simultaneously, reduces the risk of extinction by random catastrophes such as drought, hurricanes, tsunamis, disease outbreaks (like avian influenza), and accidental introductions of non-native plants and animals.

Researchers monitoring the Midway population found that the ducks were breeding at an earlier age, and laying more eggs than birds on Laysan.

This suggests that the abundant habitat and food available on Midway stimulated greater reproductive effort in the ducks, which contributes optimism for the success of this re-introduced population.

Human disturbance may impact nesting and brooding, and landing permits to the Laysan Island refuge are granted only for official or scientific purposes.

Sea level rise and increased frequency and severity of storms are an anticipated effect of global warming and could affect the population of the Laysan duck.

The emphasis of the recovery plan is the distribution of additional viable populations in the Laysan duck's historical and prehistorical range.

[16] In 2023 the Laysan teal was featured on a United States Postal Service Forever stamp as part of the Endangered Species set, based on a photograph from Joel Sartore's Photo Ark.