Garganey
Spatula querquedula
Small and often rather unobtrusive duck of wetlands with reedy and other fringing vegetation. Handsome male distinctive, with big white eyebrow on dark brown head, pale gray flanks; pale gray forewing striking in flight. Female very similar to female Green-winged Teal but head pattern more contrasting, with paler eyebrow, darker eyestripe, and unstreaked whitish throat. Breeds widely across Eurasia; winters in Africa and southern Asia. Migrants can be on more open water, even tidal mudflats. Associates readily with other ducks; feeds mainly by dabbling.
Identification
The adult male is unmistakable, with its brown head and breast with a broad white crescent over the eye. The rest of the plumage is grey, with loose grey scapular feathers It has a grey bill and legs. In flight, it shows a pale blue speculum with a white border. When swimming it will show prominent white edges on its tertials. His crown (anatomy) is dark and his face is reddish brown.<p>Some care is needed in separating the brown female from the similar common teal, but the stronger face markings and more frequent head-shaking when dabbling are good indicators. Confusion with the female of the blue-winged teal is also possible, but the head and bill shape is different, and the latter species has yellow legs. Pale eyebrow, dark eye line, pale lore spot bordered by a second dark line.<p>Measurements:<p>These birds feed mainly by skimming rather than upending.<p>The male has a distinctive crackling mating call; the female is rather silent for a female duck, but can manage a feeble quack.<p>Garganey are rare breeding birds in the British Isles, with most breeding in quiet marshes in Norfolk and Suffolk. In Ireland a few pairs breed in County Wexford, and at Lough Beg in County Londonderry, with occasional breeding elsewhere.<p>The garganey is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) applies. The status of the garganey on the IUCN Red List is least concern.
Taxonomy
The first formal description of the garganey was by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in 1758 in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae. He introduced the binomial name Anas querquedula. A molecular phylogentic study comparing mitochondrial DNA sequences published in 2009 found that the genus Anas, as then defined, was non-monophyletic. The genus was subsequently split into four monophyletic genera with ten species including the garganey moved into the resurrected genus Spatula. This genus had been originally proposed by the German zoologist Friedrich Boie in 1822. The name Spatula is the Latin for a "spoon" or "spatula". The specific epithet is derived from Latin querquedula, a word believed to represent to its call.<p>The common English name dates from the 17th century and comes from Lombard language gargenei, the plural of garganell, which ultimately comes from the Late Latin gargala "tracheal artery". The English usage owes its origins to Conrad Gesner who used the Italian name in the third volume of his Historiae Animalium (History of Animals) of 1555.
- Scientific name
- Spatula querquedula
- Authority
- (Linnaeus, 1758)
- Order
- Anseriformes
- Family
- Anatidae
- Genus
- Spatula
Range and habitat
- Breeding range
- PAL : w Europe to Japan
- Non-breeding range
- w, c Africa and Asia to New Guinea
- Migration
- Complete migrants
Conservation
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
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