March 12, 2023 - St. Marks NWR - Ducks

While we were in Florida, I went to one of my favorite birding sites, St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge. I always see more species of birds at St. Marks than I do at any other location we visit during our Florida stay. Many ducks spend the winter at St. Marks. This is a male Hooded Merganser. When he gets excited, he can raise the feathers on the back of his head high enough so that the white spot becomes a full circle.

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This is a female Canvasback. Female ducks can be hard to identify because so many of them have dull, brown plumage with few color highlights. The distinctive “ski-slope” beak is the clue that tells me this is a Canvasback.

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A Ruddy Duck is a small (15 inch) bird with a stiff tail that is often raised into the air like this one is. This is a male in non-breeding plumage. When he molts next month, his body feathers will all be a bold, rusty color and his beak will turn light blue.

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This is a female Red-breasted Merganser. That long, thin beak has serrated edges to help her hang on to the slippery fish that she catches.

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I think the male Northern Pintail is one of our most elegant looking ducks.

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Here’s the Pintail dipping under the water to reach some food. He’s giving us a good look at the tail feathers that give him his name.

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This is a male Redhead. Some years we see huge flocks of Redheads floating in the water as we drive along the Gulf of Mexico shore.

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Here’s another drab female duck. The ring of white feathers at the base of its beak, the black tip and the general shape of the beak, give it away as a female Redhead. See the previous photo to notice the resemblance.

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This is either a Greater or Lesser Scaup They can be difficult to identify because they have almost identical plumage. One key difference is the shape of the back of the head. Lesser Scaup have a noticeable peak of feathers there. This bird’s head is nicely rounded, not peaked, so I’m calling it a Greater Scaup.

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Another drab, brown, female duck. The huge, spoon-shaped beak, however, gives it away as a Northern Shoveler.

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These ducks are male Green-winged Teal. The green stripes on their rusty faces don’t show up very well in this photo, but that is a good field mark to identify them.

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This female duck is really plain looking. However, she was in a group with several male Green-winged Teal, so I think she is also a Green-winged Teal.

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This is an American Wigeon, and the white stripe on top of its head indicates this is a male.

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