Saturday, 23 June 2012

Mucky ducks multiplying

I ended up having a leisurely visit to Crossness this morning, after umming and arring last night whether or not to head to one of my old haunts at New Brighton to see a Little Swift. In the end tiredness and lethargy won. So, thoroughly expecting to see very little, I was pleasantly surprised to at least have something to look at this morning - there were now 3 Ruddy Shelduck x Common Shelduck hybrids on the foreshore.
Ruddy x Common Shelduck - bird 1 (same bird as last weekend)

Ruddy x Common Shelduck - bird 2

Ruddy x Common Shelduck - bird 3
Up until the summer before last, there was a regular Ruddy Shelduck but this seems to have been replaced by these birds, potentially its offspring.

Rotherhithe had a few large gulls, including a 2nd-summer Yellow-legged Gull, while there were a couple of Common Terns on Surrey Water (but no chicks).
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1 comment:

  1. Rob Innes24 June 2012 at 18:12

    Hi Rich -

    If those birds are Common x Ruddy Shelduck, where do they get their prominent white eyerings from?

    I've been puzzling over a similarly motley set of birds in SW Middx recently, which I think may be Australian x Ruddy or South African.

    Seems a reasonable game to play in late June!

    All best,

    Rob

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