Also, many of the sea ducks like eiders and scoters also use their wings to some degree underwater for additional propulsion. Generally, diving ducks like scaup, goldeneyes, bufflehead, Redhead and Canvasback only use their feet.
Jeff Kozma
Yakima
----- Original Message -----
From: Dennis Paulson
To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
Sent: Wednesday, December 29, 2010 12:32 PM
Subject: Re: [Tweeters] Bufflehead underwater
Kelly,
Diving birds have to swim underwater with the feet exactly opposed. They are moved rapidly but over a fairly short stroke. I can envision them turning slow somersaults underwater if the feet were paddled below them, and I think they get much more power by opposing the feet and moving them in unison. The only exception I know of is in guillemots, which may paddle with their feet for short-distance propulsion while mainly swimming with their wings underwater.
One of the thrilling things of birding to me is seeing diving birds underwater. I wish I could see it a lot more often. I've always thought there should be underwater viewing chambers where diving birds are common. Maybe at the Seattle Aquarium with feeding stations?
Dennis
-----
Dennis Paulson
1724 NE 98 St.
Seattle, WA 98115
206-528-1382
dennispaulson at comcast.net
On Dec 29, 2010, at 12:01 PM, tweeters-request at mailman2.u.washington.edu wrote:
Date: Tue, 28 Dec 2010 19:11:31 -0800
From: "Kelly Cassidy" <lostriver at completebbs.com>
Subject: RE: [Tweeters] Bufflehead underwater
To: "'Lyn Topinka'" <pointers at pacifier.com>,
<tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Message-ID: <007201cba706$19405540$4bc0ffc0$ at com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
Thanks, Lyn. It was interesting that his feet were stuck out to the side
inside of under or behind. Wonder why that is?
Kelly Cassidy
Pullman, WA
-----Original Message-----
From: tweeters-bounces at mailman2.u.washington.edu
[mailto:tweeters-bounces at mailman2.u.washington.edu] On Behalf Of Lyn Topinka
Sent: Tuesday, December 28, 2010 2:55 PM
To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
Subject: [Tweeters] Bufflehead underwater
hi group ... Gene and I went to Westmoreland Park (Portland) for a
Christmas afternoon walk ... at one point we hid against the trees
and pretended we were part of them ... the male Bufflehead came very
close ... I tried to shoot the sequence of him diving and then
re-surfacing ... got some !!! ... and yes, I did adjust the
light/dark of the underwater images a bit to show him better ...
diving ...
http://columbiariverimages.com/Birds/Images10Dec/westmoreland_park_bufflehea
d_male_diving_12-25-10_B.jpg
underwater ...
http://columbiariverimages.com/Birds/Images10Dec/westmoreland_park_bufflehea
d_male_underwater_12-25-10.jpg
right before he popped up ...
http://columbiariverimages.com/Birds/Images10Dec/westmoreland_park_bufflehea
d_male_underwater_12-25-10_B.jpg
back on the surface ...
http://columbiariverimages.com/Birds/Images10Dec/westmoreland_park_bufflehea
d_male_surfacing_12-25-10.jpg
enjoy,
Lyn
Lyn Topinka
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