The northern cinnamon teal is a strikingly beautiful duck. I've seen several from a distance and gotten poor photos, but this last Friday I got some relatively good photos near the Salton Sea in Niland in a marsh maintained by the water district.
There are five subspecies, one of which may be extinct. The northern cinnamon teal breeds from British Columbia to northwestern New Mexico and they winter in northwestern South America.
The adult mail has a cinnamon-red head and body, a brown back, a red eye and a dark bill. The female is quite plain, very similar to a female blue-winged teal, although it has a richer color and has a longer bill that is more spatulate. It has a mottle brown body, a pale brown head, brown eyes and a gray bill.
Wow, that is a dramatic-looking bird, kind of like Lady Macbeth with her bloody hands. (I never understood why cinnamon is the name for a red color. Cinnamon is really brown with just a hint of red.)
ReplyDeleteWas sukrpirsed to see ducks and shorebirds this week at Salton Sea near Bombay Beach. Quite sure I saw a dozen or more cinnamon teals, both males and females! Exciting, as we don't get them in Minnesota, and also because it may show that the Salton Sea has grown less toxic.
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