ML126748441

Age

Not specified

Sex

Not specified

Observation details

Continuing Juvenile Common Shelduck present in back pool just south of Odiorne State Park. Time of arrival is as expected for dispersing juvenile birds from their recently colonized range in Iceland. Despite some rumors, the local waterfowl breeder was contacted and not only are they not missing any ducks, but they don't even have any Shelducks. With the recent acceptance of the NL bird from the provincial committee, it seems more than likely that Common Shelduck will be added to the ABA list this year in the latest update (due out in Oct?). There seem to be three generally accepted records in the last couple of years: Renews, Newfoundland Apr 02, 2014 http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S21016976 Sept-Iles, Quebec, Dec 08, 2016 http://ebird.org/ebird/qc/view/checklist/S32929840 Saint John, New Brunswick, Dec 28, 2016 http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S33270506 Before these, there were records from Quidi Vidi Lake (http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S26355714) and Quebec that may have pertained to either wild birds (more than probable for NL) or escapees. One additional bird from MA (http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S5620746) was determined to have questionable origins by the state committee. There are several recent August Records in ebird matching the expected dispersal pattern for the species (Aug-Nov arrival per Howell et al.): from Quebec; http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S31120075 from Quebec; http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S24253444 from NY: http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S38621944 this bird from NH; http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S38645352 This reminds me a lot of the days when people were adamant that Barnacle Goose records were all of escaped birds. After about 120 records, they were finally determined to be regularly occurring vagrants to NA (see http://aba.org/birding/v40n3p46.pdf). Common Shelducks have seen a significant range expansion in Iceland and should be an expected vagrant to NA. While I agree that care should be taken to determine if there are any signs of captive origin, perhaps this shouldn't be the null hypothesis? There is nothing to suggest captive origin (halux intact, not pinioned, no odd feather wear) and timing is consistent with a natural vagrant.

Technical information

Model

Canon EOS 7D Mark II

Lens

Canon EF 400mm f/5.6L

ISO

800

Focal length

400 mm

Flash

Flash did not fire, auto

f-stop

f/5.6

Shutter speed

1/1250 sec

Dimensions

5049 pixels x 3366 pixels

Original file size

6.31 MB