[obol] Tufted Duck- Didactic not timely

[Lars and Gail Norgren]

      We hopefully can look forward to the
best three months of the year for sheer
variety of ducks in western Oregon's lowlands.
Above all exotic species. On Dec 14 while
scouting for the Coos CBC Tim Rodenkirk saw
a female Tufted Duck on the Weyerhauser settling
pond. At the time virtually every other birder
in the state had put prudence before valor and
sought  shelter from the highest winds in over a
decade. But Tim seized the opportunity for
enhanced ID conditions and in 70mph winds
had no trouble seeing the very discreet tuft
sported by the hen of this species.
     After the calm returned the ducks of lower
Coos Bay had largely removed themselves. David
Smith, Tim, and I spent the better part of an
hour sifting through diving ducks on WSP
without the desired result. Then Tim and I
proceeded to Millicoma Marsh where he spent
at least one precious hour that would have been
better spent out of his budget on sleep, to
get me the Zono grand slam. A few steps from
the state's most august sparrow stakeout is
a small sewage treatment pond. After the
bashful Harris' Sparrow finally appeared
Tim went home and I checked out the pond.
      A standard issue male RING-NECKED DUCK
was accompanied by a bird all but identical
to the female Tufted Duck as illustrated by
Sibley. That's where the mischief begins,
because Sibley's picture does not match my memory
of the female Tufteds I have seen throughout
northern Europe, or the pictures in European
field guides at my house.
     The Ring-necked Duck had a yellow-orange
eye. The other duck's eye was the color of
canned corn. I mean the canned corn I got in
school lunches back in the Sixties. I could
smell the cafeteria at John Adams Elementary
as I looked it in the eye. As one of the few
subscribers to Obol that grew up with Munsell's
color charts at my fingertips it seems odd to use this
subjective descriptor, but I trust it conveys
more meaning to most readers than some archane
code would.
     I bring up eye color first because not only
does it indicate how close I was to the bird(the
sewage lagoon at Millicoma is the size of a rather
large swimming pool) but it might give a clue
to the age as well as gender of the bird. Dec 16
is not too late to exclude both eclipse plumaged
drakes as well as juvenile plumages. There was no
visible tuft, generally the case with adult drakes
in autumn. The head was very square- a square cornered
forehead and a very sharp angle above the nape.
Lars Jonsson in translation(re female Tufted)"somewhat
squarish yet never the less rounded head shape".
The bill was light gray with a white sub-terminal
band before the black nail. The older Nat Geo field
guide not only depicts female Tufteds without this
bill ring, but says in the text"Lacks...white bill
ring of female Ring-neck". Tim, Dave and I had been
moving on from any duck we saw on the north spit
when we saw a bill ring. This is an error on the part
of National Geographic. The head was completely dark
brown with widespread green irridesence. No white feathers
at the base of the bill, around the eyes, or under the chin.
No shading or pale fields as in a female Ring-neck.
      The back, chest, folded wings, and under-tail coverts
were all a similar dark color to the head. The side-coverts,
or "paddle-box" as Ernest Thompson-Seaton liked to call them,
were cafe-au-lait colored, contrasting crisply with the
breast, undertail coverts and folded wings. THis is how
Sibley portrays the bird, but I recall female Tufted Ducks
as being evenly dark over the whole body. This is how
all my European field guides portray them as well. The bird
at Coos Bay also had a very faint, short "spur" in front
of the folded wing. Not white as in a male Ring-neck,but
paler than the rest of the side coverts, and not nearly
as high up the sides. Pretty much the way Sibley portrays
the spur on female Ring-necks.
     It's really a pretty good fit for male Tufted Duck
in pre-breeding plumage. THe eye color bothers me. It
seems like it should be lemon yellow-"Cadmium yellow
medium", not canned corn, if the bird is male. Maybe
eye color is seasonal, or an immature male? And why
does Sibley illustate a pale sided female Tufted? Is
this simply erroneous or do birds from the Far East
look this way?
      Lars Norgren MANNING OREGON