Hooded Merganser

Another new one for my North Dakota bird photo collection.
Male (Drake) Hooded Merganser (Lophodytes cucullatus)
Raised Crest, evidently (cornell).
He makes a distinct funny/odd sound (enature).

audubon:
 His most distinguishing feature is his crest, or “hood.” At rest or in flight, this hood appears as little more than a white line behind the eye, but when the drake is alert on the water, the fully-raised crest reveals an elaborate hood of white on an otherwise black head.

So in other words, he can look quite different on water depending on how he holds his head.
(google it)

npwrc
(Ducks at a Distance)

More Duck Families

The waterhole by the road was full of duck families and various blackbirds and/or grackles. I took tons of pics and couldn't identify everything.

Here are some duck families.

This first one might be a shoveler because of that bill.


Northern Shoveler Anas clypeata:
enature
cornell
npwrc

Pintail maybe?:


With that one (pintail?), the female appeared out of the grass first, and then it was like more and more babies followed. lol I counted eight total on my pictures, but there could have been more.

Northern Pintail Anas acuta:
enature
cornell
npwrc

Gadwall? Mallard?:


I think this one had nine? babies. Not sure. I hadn't realized ducks have such large families. After seeing all of these, I'll remember.

Gadwall Anas strepera:
enature
cornell
npwrc

Mallard Anas platyrhynchos:
enature
cornell
npwrc
Previous blog post.

Ruddy Rudy

Waterhole by road pics.



Ruddy Duck
We called the male "Aqua Quacker" because of that aqua blue bill.
Or how about Ruddy Rudy.

He doesn't "quack" like a mallard does, though. Listen to the sounds at:

Cornell
Ruddy Duck Oxyura jamaicensis
enature
Also:
npwrc
Ducks at a Distance
A Waterfowl Identification Guide

The Wood Duck Family

There were so many babies, I couldn't count them all and they disappeared quickly.



Site: water in ditch alongside road.

Same spot, next day:



Busy scratching and fluffing feathers.

At first, I thought this was an adult female because of the size, however, looking at the face markings, I think this might be an immature wood duck. The mature female wood duck has a distinct white color around the eye that is different from younger wood ducks.

See previous blog post on wood duck with male and female together.

Mallards

Don't have any mallard pics posted to my blog either.
Here's the couple:


Quack, quack, quack:





In flight (not very good, but I'll post anyway):


npwrc
cornell
enature

UPDATE: 23 May 10
More, different views of the mallard.
Same place, maybe not same duck.
These were taken with the XSi and tele, so a little closer. I did some layer masking to sharpen duck and soften background a little more.

Wood Duck

My first pic of a wood duck.
The males do look like wooden decoys instead of real ducks.

npwrc
npwrc2
Ducks at a Distance
A Waterfowl ID Guide - Wood Duck

enature
cornell

Favorite Pic From Long Lake

And this is my favorite photo from our Long Lake trip.


That's the way it was straight out of the camera. Shocker. lol
I think the duck is a blue-winged teal cuz of that blue patch on the wing and female because of the face.

Drake head pic here.

Blue-Winged Teal Duck

I think this duck is male (drake?) Blue-winged Teal.

Ducks at a Distance
A Waterfowl ID Guide - Blue-Winged Teal