Birders,

While birding yesterday along the Nicola River, I had some close
looks at a hybrid male BARROW'S X COMMON GOLDENEYE in the river about
3 km west of Merritt. The bird was sitting cheek-by-jowl with a male
COMMON GOLDENEYE for a good comparison. The hybrid goldeneye had a
teardrop-shaped white spot at the base of the bill, intermediate
between the typically crescent-shaped mark of Barrow's Goldeneye and
the circular spot of the Common. In bright sunlight, it showed both
purplish and greenish iridescence on the head, as opposed to purplish
for typical Barrow's and greenish for typical Common. The head shape
was also intermediate between the angular profile of normal Barrow's
and the more rounded profile of Common. Finally, the wing coverts
showed more black than a Common Goldeneye, but much less than a
typical Barrow's. I had leisurely scope views of the two birds
swimming and diving together less than 30 metres away.

The hybrid goldeneye was seen from the Lindley Creek Road, which
parallels the Nicola River on the south side opposite Highway 8, about
3 km west of Merritt.

Barrow's X Common Goldeneye is a relatively rare waterfowl hybrid.
I have seen such hybrids only 3 or 4 times before. One of these was
off the seawall in Vancouver's Stanley Park in about 1984; I have a
written description of this bird on file somewhere. I cannot remember
exact details of the other sightings offhand.

This should serve as just another example to remind us that the
only reason the world is not flooded with waterfowl hybrids is because
of the highly species-specific responses of females to male courtship
displays. Most waterfowl species have no insurmountable physiological
barriers to hybridization within a genus, and sometimes even across
genera.

If anyone else out there has seen a Barrow's X Common
Goldeneye sometime but has not put it on record, it would be worth
doing so. As I mentioned, this is a relatively rare hybrid in the
wild.

Perhaps this could be considered an extension of the "hybrid
goose" thread on OBOL?? :-)

Wayne C. Weber,
114-525 Dalgleish Drive
Kamloops, B.C. V2C 6E4
Phone: (250) 377-8865
wayne_weber at bc.sympatico.ca