ML129812081
Contributor
Date
Location
- Age
- Not specified
- Sex
- Not specified
Observation details
A conservative estimate: I saw somewhere around half of the birds at the pond with their heads up. Of these, drakes and identifiable females outnumbered Greater Scaup by around 3:1. Part of this 115 includes around 40 or 50 birds that flew into the south (parking lot side of the pond) showing white in the wing limited to secondaries and gray primaries. As shown in the photo above these resting drakes show a bright purplish gloss, but more importantly have the hallmark "rear peak nub" (my phrase), not the long front-peaking flat heads of Greater. Note these Greaters usually showed green gloss, however, as they loafed around, the green would occasionally turn a dull matt purplish- never as bright as LESC, however. It does not seem unusual that in this driest year in recorded history, with no water present in the interior, LESC would outnumber GRSC at this location: "Numbers vary depending on water conditions and the strength of fall flight (DR, Mty birds)."
Technical information
- Model
- Canon EOS 7D
- ISO
- 640
- Focal length
- 500 mm
- Flash
- Flash did not fire, auto
- Shutter speed
- 1/1250 sec
- Dimensions
- 2478 pixels x 1234 pixels
- Original file size
- 842.46 KB