Shelduck ID - Pennington UK (1 Viewer)

Hi,
I saw this unusual "Shelduck" with 4 other normal Shelducks at Pennington, Hampshire, this afternoon.
A quick google check seems to imply it's a Female Australian Shelduck, am I correct?
Also, I presume this is an escapee...although no ID rings could be seen.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks
Richie

Shelduck - follow up

It was a pleasure to meet you at Fishtail today. We followed up your directions to the shelduck group, without success. The light was failing, so we may simply have missed them. Good photo effort though. Was that with your phone's camera, through the scope? If so, there's hope for all of us. John O-C

hybrid Aegyptian Goose X Common Shelduck

Thanks

Hi Vinch and "Watermain" thankyou for the ID. The bird certainly had Egyptian Goose aspects. Yes it was a phonescope attempt, came out better than I expected at X50 magnification.
Hope to catch up with you again.
Richie

Vinch said:

hybrid Aegyptian Goose X Common Shelduck

Click to expand...

HI ,

I am not sure. I think it is more in line with hybrids ruddy x common shelduck:

http://www.flickr.com/groups/hybridbirds/discuss/72157601886415063/

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2767/4042303233_c1de3ffa13.jpg

http://avesnavarra.blogspot.com/2007/11/antida-sin-identificar.html

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_1qzCTcWnG5g/RzdgZlEZVCI/AAAAAAAAAbs/PsFNDEzQSZc/s400/0035607.JPG




Here is Egyptian goose x common shelduck:

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_enLt7mLPv...l76kBwI/s320/Ganso+hibrido+IMG_5758.JPG-1.jpg

scroll down here to see another photo of this one:

http://naturalezaenquinto.blogspot.com/2009_05_01_archive.html

Hi Joern,
Thank you for your interesting comments.
I have looked through the pictures and have compared them with my notes/photos.
It does appear to be more like a Ruddy Shelduck X Common Shelduck cross.
The bird is similar to many of the examples you gave, however not identical.
The closest bird being this:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/yeliseev/4042303233/

The body and wing colours are the same.

The differences were:
Head and neck should be black.
There should be a teardrop shaped white eye ring.
The sides of the bill were a pale pink/orange, the central part of the bill was grey.

Other point of interest.
The underside of the wings were the same as a normal Shelduck.
The forewing was white and partly visible when the wings were folded.
There was a green wing panel.

An interesting bird, that hopefully will be photographed again soon.

Richie