With respect to diving times. I timed a red-necked grebe in a dive on
Flathead Lake, MT over labor day (a full-gown juvenile) that stayed down
51 seconds. Is there a Guinness Book of records for such trivia?

Gene Hunn.

On Fri, 8 Sep 1995, Michael Price wrote:

> Hi Tweeters
>
> On Sept. 07, Stuart MacKay said:
>
> (snip)
> >There were several mallards diving in
> >the main pond at Montlake Fill, presumably going after weeds on the bottom.
> >There were a couple of "typical" males and the females also clearly showed
> >the
> >blue speculum so there is no doubt as to the identity. For once I brought my
> >binoculars.
> >
> >The birds stayed under for several seconds c5. Also some birds tried the
> >technique but couldn't quite make it - thrashing away on the surface.
> >
> >Most bizarre,
> >
> >Stuart
>
> The first time you see this is somewhat upsetting to the natural order
> wherein dabbling ducks float and upend, and only diving ducks dive.
>
> Nothing is simple. I believe I may have related an experience (a fussier way
> of saying "Stop me if I've told this one before ...") where I stood on the
> little wooden bridge at Jericho Pk. in Vancouver BC and watched several
> Mallard ducklings, each about a month old, happily diving in about three
> feet of water, repeatedly heading for the bottom like the kids that would
> dive for coins around a Matson liner, *to feed on a carp carcass*.
>
> I'm not, as the irreplaceable Anna Russell once said, making this up. Each
> fuzzy little urchin would jump-dive like a veteran grebe, propel itself down
> to the bottom, grab a mouthful, two, three, of carp and wolf them down on
> its way back up for air. All three did this, and I watched in head-shaking
> bemusement as sometimes all three worried at the carcass simultaneously like
> the world's three warmest, fuzziest, cutest little sharks.
>
> As for adults diving, I'd wonder if food was the objective. It's
> disconcerting to see a flock of twenty Mallards in front of you, turn away
> to say something to a companion, turn back a few seconds later to see empty
> water with ripples. I've observed that, with Mallards and Canada Geese,
> diving seems to have a more social context, indicating higher than normal
> levels of friction(?), excitement(?), fun(?). Or it may be a part of
> preening, a way to blast parasites off the plumage.
>
> For what it's worth, I've never seen Mallards or Canada Geese dive that
> weren't washing and preening in a group beforehand (concomitantly, I've
> never seen a lone duck or goose dive, though I've observed this behavior
> nearly a thousand times at Lost Lagoon in Stanley Pk.). It seems to start
> with one bird, then two or three, then the whole lot crash-diving repeatedly.
> A typical dive for a Mallard is, as Stuart observed, about 3-5 sec., though
> I counted one male down 09 sec.; a Canada Goose typically stays down longer,
> about 6-8 sec.
>
> They don't seem to travel far, either one. A Mallard at Lost Lagoon or
> Jericho typically travels about 1-2 meters underwater, a goose up to 3-4
> meters. Another indication of a non-food motivation is that these are
> invariably open-wing dives; the bird dives with its wings almost completely
> extended, the least efficient shape for getting around underwater (okay,
> okay, you don't have to have the world's most streamlined shape in order to
> catch fleeing pond scum).
>
> Now, if we could only teach them synchronised dance patterns in time for
> Atlanta...
>
> BTW, Stuart, I don't think you're really 'most bizarre', it's just the
> result of those antibodies one gets from a childhood bout of presbyterianism
> ;-)
>
> Michael Price
> Vancouver BC Canada
> michael_price at mindlink.bc.ca
>
>