Look at enough birds, and you’ll quickly figure out that no two individuals are the same. Even puddle ducks, with their simple, blocky plumages, show plenty of variation from one to the next, some brighter, some duller. Drake American Wigeon are no exception: some have very broad, very extensive green face-stripes, others less so. And a few drakes have startlingly creamy white heads, with very little of the streaking and mottling that makes “normal” wigeon so gray-headed.
I saw two such birds over the long Thanksgiving weekend, one at Willcox and one at Tucson’s Lakeside Park.
The Willcox bird was very striking even at a distance, with a notable yellowish tint to the face and quite extensive green. Sunday’s Tucson bird was a little more freckly, but still obviously different from his companions.
This individual also had a little bit less green on the head than the Willcox bird, creating a bizarre pattern when it rolled and preened.
A quick glance through some of the standard resources doesn’t turn much up about variation in American Wigeon’s head pattern; BNA does illustrate a reasonably pale-headed bird (still a bit more spotted than the Lakeside bird).
How often do you see American Wigeon of this type? Looking for them in big wigeon flocks can be more rewarding than looking for Eurasian Wigeon!
