CLOSED: Need help identifying this duck

Not sure...maybe American Black duck.

1st picture

Thanks

Here's the 2nd shot

I think American Black Duck. Have never seen one in person

Hmm, with the black bill, how about female pintail? Did it appear, in other postures, to have a longish neck?

Escaped farmyard ducks. Derived from Mallard.

Resin

Alterngardener I don't know these are the only pics I found as I was going thru my un-id'd folder.

Resin what would be the name...Mallard hybrid...or should I just say ducks. So I wasn't crazy when I could not find it in my books or online.

Thanks

I'd just call them escaped farmyard ducks. They're not wild birds, so don't count for anything in wildlife recording. Just like if you were recording mammals, you'd not include a herd of dairy cows in a field.

On another forum one person suggested calling them duck à l'orange ;-)

Resin

Sounds good to me.

Thanks

Resin,

In this area (Pennsylvania), we have a number of Am Black Duck/Mallard hybrids in the wild. Could this duck be a wild hybrid i/o of just a derivative farm duck?

Hi Jec - I'd guess that's a theoretical possibility, but it isn't needed to explain it - I've seen identical farmyard ducks over here, and there's no Black Ducks here for hybrids to be produced.

Plumage apart, one important pointer to farmyard duck is the way the rear end floats very high in the water; this is due to the big fat deposits that farmyard ducks carry under their tails (they've been bred for excessive obesity for centuries!).

Resin

Quote Resin "they've been bred for excessive obesity for centuries!" /Quote

Sounds like most Americans :)

(sorry I couldn't resist, I've been watching too much Top Gear on BBC America lately )