At Marymoor the other day, an immature eagle hunting on Lake Sammamish drew
my attention to an odd duck. The bird appeared to be entirely white except
for
its wings, which appeared to be black. It was a pretty good way off and I
might
have missed it if the eagle hadn't been (unsuccessfully) dive-bombing it and
its
young one.

It was just close enough for its excited quack to be audible, and it sounded
like a
mallard -- though I must confess I know very little of the sounds of other
ducks --
and seemed to be about the right size as well. The quack and the trailing
duckling
were the only good clues to the identity of this bird; I'd have been mighty
confused
without them.

I would not be surprised to happen across a white mallard (domestic
hybrid?), but I was
surprised that such a bird would have black wings. Is there anyone out
there who
has had a better look at this one? Does this pattern regularly occur among
birds as
a mutation, or is hybridization the only reasonable explanation?


Jim McCoy
jfmccoy at earthlink.net
Redmond, WA


P.s. The duckling from a distance looked like any other -- yellow but
darkening. I'm not
sure how old it must be, except to say that it seemed sizeable enough to
be more than just a couple of days old.