Aurora borealis: <b>Hooded Merganser (incl photos)</b>

April 18, 2006

Hooded Merganser (incl photos)

Aurora header.jpg

Shocking news came through to me on Sunday morning from DC – a drake Hooded Merganser had arrived the previous day on Unst. Why oh why not West Loch?! Like a fool I’d left my mobile to run down its battery, so I’d not heard the news break on Saturday afternoon, and hadn’t made it up there on Sunday. As it happened, this turned out for the best, as the inter-island ferries run much more regularly on weekdays rather than Sundays, so a trip up yesterday made for far less time away from home. Also, JL was free yesterday, so we left the island on the 6.30am boat and hastened north.

Three ferry crossings later, we were on Unst, and driving up to the small pool at Haroldswick where the bird had been seen on the previous two days. As we approached the turning for the pool, I asked JL if he felt optimistic it’d still be there. He did. Secretly, I didn't.

The pool was tiny, so there could be no doubt about what we found. Which was precisely bugger all. No ducks at all, let alone a drake Hooded Merganser. A Pied Wagtail and a male Reed Bunting were both new for the year for me, but hardly worth a trip to Unst for.

We tried the second location DC had given us, Loch of Cliff. A biting wind coming off the water made our walk along the banks of the loch an uncomfortable one, and the bitter pill of a still non-existent duck that little harder to swallow. Back at the car, we met PS, also searching for the bird. We set off in convoy for the north end of the loch, and there bumped into WD, the lucky finder of the duck – certainly an unexpected but well-earned addition to her WEBS census! She recommended a couple more locations in the north of Unst, but seemed a little fatalistic about our chances – it hadn’t been seen all morning, and the latter half of the night had been fairly clear…

Off we went, following our new leads. Some nice flooded field corners, and a few Teal proving their attraction to wildfowl, but no Merganser. We decided that enough was enough – we both needed to get home to our respective families, and couldn’t waste time looking for an apparently absent duck. We drove back towards Haroldswick, en route to the ferry… and in the near distance saw PS’s Saab, lights flashing. Good news… he’d re-found it, back on the pool at Haroldswick. A swift half mile dash, and we were watching a cracking drake Hooded Merganser feeding actively in bright sunlight.

The bird simply glowed in the perfect viewing conditions; we didn’t dare get out of the car for fear of flushing the bird, so managed to scope and photograph from within the car instead. The bird dived repeatedly, before settling down to preen on the water; a good chance to eliminate the possibility of rings on one leg at least, as it scratched its head with its left foot. PS later confirmed he’d seen the right leg was ring-free too.

BM and his wife arrived some 15 minutes later, and we continued to watch the bird from our respective cars. Suddenly, without warning it was off; exploding off the water and flying high away from us. It appeared to be heading back towards Loch of Cliff, but we’d seen enough – we had a ferry to catch.

What of its provenance? You certainly won’t find a Shetland birder who isn’t counting this wary, un-ringed and fully winged Nearctic duck as a genuine wild vagrant. But then, having seen it, we would say that wouldn’t we? The last potential ‘first’ Hooded Merganser, a female in autumn 2000 on North Uist was consigned to the limbo of Category D of the British list:

D Species that would otherwise appear in Category A except that there is reasonable doubt that they have ever occurred in a natural state. Species placed in Category D only form no part of the British List, and are not included in the species totals.
Source : British Ornithologists’ Union – The British List Species categories

A decision which made no sense then, and one which I fear will be in the pipeline for this bird too. Possibly more readily still, as this one’s a glamorous and more outlandish drake. Here’s the odd thing… if this was a drake of another Nearctic species with striking plumage, commonly kept in captivity, say a Blue-winged Teal, an American Wigeon, or a a Bufflehead, it would coast straight to acceptance as a genuine vagrant, and its rightful place in Category A. But for some reason Hooded Mergansers are a big no-no, and the possibility of a ‘vagrant’ HM being from a captive origin precludes acceptance. Whereas the exact same possibility of a captive origin for any of the other Nearctic duck species is seemingly not a problem.

Take Bufflehead for example. The BBRC are prepared to accept as a genuine vagrant a long-staying Bufflehead turning up in midsummer 2002 in the south-east county of Suffolk. How on earth can that be more acceptable than a Hooded Merganser in North Uist or Unst in the midst of autumn and spring migration respectively? Or more to the point, as I don’t wish to belittle that Bufflehead record, how are those HM records any less acceptable?

Of course, BBRC and BOURC are separate ratifying bodies. My gripe is most emphatically not with the BBRC - but I’m sure I’m not alone in being bewildered by the BOURC’s rationale for acceptance. All Nearctic ducks are equally plausible as vagrants, but some it seems are more equal than others.