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ID Duck abbotsbury swannery (1 Viewer)

normally, I wait for smarter people like Joern to answer and learn from them, but: when you cover the head and breast with your hand and just look at the rear part, I see colours of a Egyptian Goose and in the right places.

So: I think its either an abberant Egyptian Goose (gut feeling says its not, but unsure) or a hybrid with this species. And for more, I wait for others to join in. Thank you in advance!

Edit: I hesitate, was it right to answer. There are so many species like South African Shellduck, which I have only seen in captivity and once as an escape, which could also explan some colour of this bird. But the colours of the rear were good for Egyptian Goose....
 
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Thanks everyone, i really appreciate your answers.

Andy, i wouldn't have posted it if i thought it was a domestic duck but i thought it was a hybrid of two wild ducks.

Alexander, thanks for your reply, i was also wondering about the South African Duck.

Welsh Peregrine, I just found the youtube video and i think you have the answer with Shelduck X Eider hybrid. It certainly looks like the duck in the video and the head does resemble an eider.

Many thanks

Dave
 
Microtus said:
What a wild combo, and what a wonderful name for the German bird.
Click to expand...

The story i was told about the name was that from plumage they just didn´t know if the bird was male or female....so they searched for a name that fit both...

Don´t know if that´s true though, but makes a good story.
 
As I understand from Grahames comment, this is a hybrid with proven parentage? And from the other comments, that its IDable as such. So I write some comments and hope to get answers, so I can learn:

I made an ID, because I saw colours of an Egyptian Goose, for example the grey-brown of the flanks. This isnt present in either Eider or Shellduck.
The undertail coverts have the right buff-orange-tone for Egyptian Goose, in Shellduck this colour (never?) reaches up to the tail, like in this bird.

The feathers on the flanks are vermiculated, a pattern that reminded me of Egyptian Goose. Such a pattern isnt present in either Shellduck or Eider, most similar is juvenile Eider, but clearly different.
https://nrw.nabu.de/imperia/md/nabu...l/gaense/140922-nabu-nilgaense-helge-may.jpeg
http://tierdoku.de/images/thumb/585px-Nilgans-male-0978.jpg

Jörn wrote in a paper: "Eine Ursache dafür ist, dass die Variabilität von Hybriden wesentlich höher ist als die innerartliche Variabilität der Elternarten."

And I remember a comment by Christoph Randler that there are patterns and colours that arent present in the parent species, but in an "ancestor-species" (something as a "ancient-ground-pattern") and come out again in the hybrid.

Is this the case here?

Thank you all for your help!
 
That is the difficulty in hybrids, especially if not closely related, that you indeed have patterns and colorations which are not present in either parent.

But even in closely related species you can have that, e.g . in the hybrid Aythya nyroca x Aythya fuligula:
https://www.hbw.com/sites/default/f...ammar_skane_20161113_2_1000.jpg?itok=tvwkEkTm
Neither of the parents has such clear vermiculated flank pattern.

Mergus merganser x Somateria molissima also has vermiculated flank pattern - here one of the Dortmund zoo birds with proven parentage
https://www.zoochat.com/community/m...r-hybrid-at-dortmund.207755/full?d=1354021220


so this seems something appearing in very different duck crosses.

furthermore there are some strange coloration shifts in some hybrids . for example Gadwall x Nortehrn shoveler: Rusty flank coloration of shoveler is shifted to the breast (underlying the scaly gadwall breast pattern):

https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PVMikynF...EOpMHwEi8BRWWGm4mQwL_DZQDwCLcB/s1600/3175.jpg

https://www.flickr.com/photos/79552451@N05/17312079971

For the Eider x Shellduck there are some known cases with known parentage, but also structurally it fist.

However if we hadn´t had cases in captivity this would have been truly difficult
 
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