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Teal, Taiwan (1 Viewer)

modrawnu

Active member
Here is a teal from southern Taiwan by my friend. (The rightmost one in the photo). He said the female Green-winged Teal looks so wierd by the followings:
1) the white semi-circular shaped eyerings
2) white spot at the bill base
3) whitish throat area

So, is it any possibilty of Blue-winged Teal, or just a variation one ?

Thanks.

Date: 7th March, 2017
Location: Pingtung County, Taiwan
 

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Looks like a Blue-winged Teal to me - big white eyelids; but are there any other images to confirm this and other features?

cheers, alan
 
Neither of the females have much the look of Garganey to me; no dark cheek stripes, no pale chins/throats/lower cheeks, no clean/defined/whitish supercilia, no peaked/ragged-looking crowns, etc.

The right female doesn't seem to have the more spatulate bill structure of Blue-winged Teal (it looks just like that of the Eurasian Teal next to it), and I don't think female Blue-winged Teal ought to show so much iridescence in the speculum. Admittedly, this comes from nothing more than a five-minute internet search, but based on that it's a Eurasian Teal for me.
 
I think the white sides to the tail are diagnostic for Eurasian (/Green-winged) Teal aren't they? The head pattern is not too unusual for female Eurasian, although I don't remember seeing one with such an obvious white eye-ring. As Steve says, the structure fits well for Eurasian as well.
 
The central bird is clearly a female Teal.

Can anyone link to a photo of a Common Teal with white eye-lids and loral spot, as in the right hand bird? I'd like to see one.

cheers, alan
 
1. Blue-winged Teal is not on the Avibase list for Taiwan at all (though it is on the list for Japan as an accidental). It doesn't rate a range map in Brazil's Birds of East Asia.

2. It's true that the eyebrow is not as visible as it can be, and the cheek not as dark, but the combination of the white bill spot with the white throat looks good for Garganey female to me (compare with the absence of these features in the female Teal in the centre of the picture). You can also see a small black line separating the bill spot from the white throat which is an ID feature specifically mentioned by Brazil. Also the feathers look distinctly more white-edged than on the female Teal in the middle of the picture, and then there's the white eye-ring.

3. It would be interesting to have more pictures, and also to ask if the OP's friend has photos for comparison that include what he thinks to be female Garganey (for comparison, and since we can see a male). The photo is clearly somewhat blown in the whites, so I'm not sure details of the colours of the birds' tails can be relied on for ID. Apparent bill size is not necessarily all that reliable in my experience (they vary, and a small difference in the angle of the head can make the size look quite different).
 

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Stopped to look at a few teal in passing today. Less than a dozen females, but at least one with paler eye crescents. Not as strong as the bird in the OP, but taken under very different light conditions (gloomy/overcast). All birds had pale loral spots to some extent (from buff to white; from distinct to diffuse; from crescent-shaped to circular).
 

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