Hello Steve,
Thank you for making an end of this "RUMOR"

Ruth Sullivan
----- Original Message -----
From: SGMlod at aol.com
To: Tweeters at u.washington.edu ; DANIELVDB at aol.com
Sent: Sunday, March 17, 2002 12:41 PM
Subject: Falcated Duck/Mandarin Duck


Greetings All

A friend of mine recently emailed me.

"Made a run up to look for the Falcated Duck today. Never saw it (apparently others did) but in the process we came upon a bed and breakfast nearby. The proprietors asked us what we were doing and invited us to view from there property and even from inside there house. We told them about the Falcated Duck which they had heard about and seen the people standing around down the street from them. This is where it gets interesting. She said that she has a friend who is a nature photographer and had photographed a family of Falcated Ducks on Big Lake about 1 or 2 years ago. She seemed confident and was very convincing but without photographs who knows."

I contacted the person who purportedly had photos of the Falcated Duck family. She kindly informed me that she has photos of a MANDARIN DUCK family and knows nothing of any Falcated Ducks.

So, no nearby Falcated Ducks being reared in captivity to be worried about.

Interestingly, the above-mentioned breeding Mandarins were actually not captive, providing the first WA breeding of feral Mandarins that I know of.

Cheers
Steven Mlodinow