Saturday 2 January 2010

Lesser Scaup?

I managed to film the hybrid Tufty x Pochard today.(2/1/2010) There were certain features that made me get quite excited ,but then there were also features that had the opposite affect. The shape of the crown and the mantle resembled Lesser Scaup, but the bill tip had too much black, although not as much as the illustration of the hybrid on page 59 of Collins. The bird flew off before I was able to scope the mantle to judge the vermiculation. As it took off my film shows a clear white wing bar on the secondaries ,but it is not obvious how far this extends. I did not notice any gloss on the head. The bird flew off at about 10.30 and could not be relocated in the afternoon. My conclusion is that it is probably a hybrid, but would be easy to confuse as a Lesser Scaup.

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