Bird of the Week – Blue-winged Teal
WC and Mrs. WC used to participate in a Birdathon for Arctic Audubon and the late Alaska Bird Observatory. It’s a fundraiser: birders get pledges for the number of species they will see in 24 hours, and then try to find as many species as they can. The more pledges and the more species, the greater the funds raised.
Blue-winged Teal, Sunnyside Pond, Fairbanks
One year, after 23.95 hours of non-stop birding, completely exhausted, we were standing at a very swampy pond in the Goldstream Valley, wondering how we would get another species. And, at the last possible minute, a Blue-winged Teal flew in. WC has had a soft spot for this species ever since.
They aren’t common in Alaska and Interior Alaska is at the limit of their usual range. But the white crescent between the eye and bill, and the brown-spotted flank are distinctive.
Camera geek stuff: f7.1, 1/160, ISO100.
For more bird photos, please visit Frozen Feather Images.
Beautiful shot.
http://a.disquscdn.com/uploads/mediaembed/images/3198/6060/original.jpg Some one finally figured out how to shut Rafael Cruz pie hole. Now,where is Rick Santorum when he is needed?
iowa has lots of teal and so do the prairie pot hole states. Fast flying li’l boogers they are.
Prairie pot hole states?
Is that kinda like Son of Pi’s beloved adopted state of Maine where folks downplay the size of bodies of water by calling everything a pond? (They call stuff a great pond if it is 10 or more acres in surface area but some of the ponds are humongous.)
Or something altogether different?
http://tinyurl.com/zy9m6p4 Here are some kewl pics of potholes. They are pretty small and non-tillable land suited for nesting ducks and geese. Enjoy.
Wow- those really are kewl pics! Kewl land also too.
One source there though though raises questions about development reducing the acreage of this kind of wetland:
“In this country, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that 1.4 million small wetlands are at high risk of drainage in the eastern Dakotas, an especially important waterfowl breeding area. If these wetlands are lost, biologists predict that breeding duck numbers in this region could decline by an estimated 2.9 million birds (37 percent). Included in these calculations is a potential loss of more than 700,000 breeding mallards a year. ”
http://www.ducks.org/conservation/habitat/potholes-in-peril/page2
I am sick and frickin tired of the human stewardship/private property beats rock paper AND scissors crap which shortsightedly wipes out so much in the quest for our madeup money gook. Pffft!
mikey is glad your link mentioned Swampbuster,because some of the pasture here where I live falls under that act and is never supposed to be tiled and farmed. The farm right north of me has similar swampy pasture and the people who farm it are talking about bulldozing the building site and tiling out the pasture and farm it all.
My landlord rents that pasture ground and cuts it for hay twice a year. There is a tile fed crick that runs through there and the windrower gets stuck along the swampy crick edge every year when they mow it. The ground underneath the pasture is black gumbo,not suitable for row crops. If you could get enough tile in there and add tons of corncobs or such to help loosen the soil you might could get a crop off it. 🙂
That is a beautiful bird! Found photos of the male flying and the coloring/markings are gorgeous.
My Pop loved these birds but I have never seen one real live.