Hi tweets,

As a preface, I'll say that for most of my bird watching years, I have
been waiting for the moment when Roger Tory Peterson, Kenn Kaufman et al
would walk into the room and say "You win, it was all a hoax, there really
is only ONE species of scaup!" Scaup were the first species I remember
misidentifying completely (Greater Scaup, New Rochelle, NY, 1971. I was
nine). I took one look at that spectacular golden eye set in the dark
head, and called them, of course, Goldeneyes. That stage lasted for
probably a year before I figured it out, and since then I am sure I have
made many more subtle mixups between Lesser and Greater Scaup.

The hardest of the various fieldmarks for me to see has always been the
wing stripe. I grew up near salt water, seeing at least 100 Greaters for
every Lesser I encountered, so I didn't get much comparative experience.
But I don't think the difference in wing pattern between the two species
is nearly so clearcut as you would think from reading field guides. At
least I never thought that until I saw a group of 16 _Aythya_ flying by in
the distance on a Christmas Count in Massachusetts. Finally I could see
clearly that the wingstripes were conspicuously grayer and shorter than in
the Greater Scaups I grew up with. Clear-cut Lesser Scaups, at
a half mile distant, no less! Jubilation! Until I got to the
compilation dinner and found out that the person across the lake from me,
who had seen them at a distance of 50 yards, had identified them as
Ring-necks. Oops. No wonder the wing stripes looked different.

So this is a long introduction to a short bird report. For those tweets
who are near or at the UW in Seattle, the three adult male Scaups that
inhabit the Drumheiler Fountain in February and March make for a great
close up study. They even eat bread from the people who feed the ducks,
so views from 10 feet in all kinds of light and all kinds of positions
(even swimming under the surface!) are easy to get, even without
binoculars. You can examine the shape of the nail on the end of the bill,
the shape of the bill and head, and the color of the sheen on the head,
the details of the patterns on the back and flank feathers.

Unfortunately (but predictably), only one species is present (Lesser), but
you can still learn a lot from those birds if this species pair has ever
bothered you. Look at the sheen on the head, for instance, and watch how
the color changes (just like a mallard's head color) depending on the
angle of the light. Bluish or purple with the sun behind it, but clearly
green when the sun is behind you, the observer. Shook me kind of badly,
at first, since green sheen is supposed to be a character for Greaters,
not Lessers, but every other feature of the ducks is a good match for
Lessers, including head shape, details of bill coloration, size and shape
of the bill nail, and habitat.

I EVEN saw the wingstripe ;)

So check em out if you get the chance.

Chris Hill
Everett, WA
cehill at u.washington.edu