At the risk of boring our readers, I am going to blog about a few brown ducks. Scaup are actually quite scarce visitors to Radipole, they often spend the winter at Lodmoor but are often distant which means views are usually not that good. But occasionally we get them at Radipole which means that views can be a quite good and we can get pictures! Today there were two first winter birds, one male and one female. Adult drakes are great looking ducks but females and first winters (birds born last summer) are often tricky to identify.
This birds a first winter drake. It’s starting to show its characteristic pale back. The main ID feature of scaup is the structure of the bird; they are usually bigger than tufted ducks and sit higher in the water. They also have quite large bills usually with just a small amount of black at the tip. A tufted duck would show a dark tip with an obvious pale band behind it.
Female have this large white patch at the front of their face, however this feature is not always a sure way of telling a scaup from other similar species. Again the bill is a good feature on this bird and also the shape of the bird.
If you’re coming along to Radipole over the next few weeks you'll have a good chance of seeing scaup along with plenty of Tufted Duck and Pochard which are super birds to see.