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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Lesser Scaup at Pennington Flash (1 Viewer)

Hi
Saw it at 5AM this morning, very sober plumage..........very dull looking bird.

Viewed it from the Sailing Club area, where it was close in.

Theres a recent photo of it on the "SurfBirds" web site.

Regards Stevie.

(also there3 Blk necked grebes)
 
Took some finding amongst the Tufted's but did eventually see it. A male eclipse bird and as Stevie said - a very dull looking bird!
 
A quick question from someone who isn't too familiar with Scaup let alone Lesser Scaup! - What are the main distinguishing features between the two?
 
Hi Ben,

Things to look out for:

Lesser Scaup is smaller than (Greater) Scaup, about the same size as a Tuftie

The head shape is different: Scaup is smoothly rounded, Lesser is peaked, with almost a short stubby crest

The drakes, Scaup has very finely vermiculated black lines across the whitish back, on Lesser they are coarser.

In flight, Scaup has a white wingbar running the length of the wing, secondaries and primaries; in lesser, the wingbar is only white on the secondaries (inner wing), dull grey on the primaries.

Next job . . . telling Lesser Scaup from a hybrid Tufted x Pochard . . . now that's really difficult, but these hybrids happen, and have to be taken into account. Well, tomorrow, its too late to do that now!!

Michael
 
Dan drough said:
Any idea which hide to view from?
Click to expand...

I saw it just after 8am yesterday morning. If you get there early in the morning the hides won't be open. They tend to be opened about 08:30am onwards.

The bird was being seen from the car park but when I saw it it was in Ramsdales bay. If you can't find it from the car park, and the hides aren't open, walk up past the visitors centre and take the centre of three paths (you will walk with a fence to your right). Eventually it will come to a point where the path takes a sharp left (with a high bank and a metal bridge in front of you). Keep going left and you will come to some fence type construction, on your left, with a red label on it (I think it has the letters L & O on it). You can view Ramsdale's bay from here.

In any case there are bound to be a few birders around and they will point you in the right direction.
 
went to see it on saturday evening,thought pennington flash was a lovely place so i am going back on tuesday to view the whole area for a few hours.....
Gary......
 
Tried for 2 hours Saturday morning. No sign of it, so I went home. Then on Birdguides it came up as sighted at 11:30 just when I left. Doh !

I did see a Kingfisher and 3 Black-necked Grebes so it wasn't a totally wasted trip.
 
Dipped

Well, thanks for all those comments. I looked at the Surfbirds site as I'm a relative novice at these things and needless to say the bird I was looking at wasn't the one photo'd. Strike off one lesser scaup for me anyway!!! Mine was probably a juv tufty!
 
I was fooled by a lot of the Tufties preening, which on first glance show very pale grey backs, until you see they are sort of twisted on their sides. Will try again on Saturday although there was no report of it today (Weds)

Avatar - I tried to find Moonie in the current home kit but I couldn't find a decent picture on the web.
 
Last edited:
TonyC said:
I was fooled by a lot of the Tufties preening, which on first glance show very pale grey backs, until you see they are sort of twisted on their sides.
Click to expand...

Hi Tony

It did take a bit of finding but I eventually saw it in Ramsdale's Bay. Once seen you will wonder why you kept missing it.

I had noticed it hadn't been reported today. I wouldn't worry about that. It is probably still there but either the birders are thin on the ground or they think that someone else will report it.

Last Sunday I noticed that the Long billed Dowitcher at Gibraltar Point had only been reported 1st thing in the morning. I was at Bempton Cliffs at 14:45 contemplating whether to go for it as it hadn't been reported. I decided to go and when I got there one of the birders told me that it had been showing well all day.

So why hadn't it been reported?
 
no one reported it? trouble with pagers is if something's not on there people don't think it might be there....... always worth a look!

good luck on Saturday tony

btw - u should sign that guy up - u need him i reckon!
 
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