Bufflehead

Two female Buffleheads greeted Erika and me at the Nisqually national wildlife refuge on 4 December 2020. The ducks fed in a large, shallow pond in a field near the refuge headquarters. What seemed odd was that the Buffleheads dabbled in such shallow water—so shallow that only the ducks’ heads went below the surface. Gauthier (2020) writes, in Birds of the World, that Buffleheads (except for the downy young) feed by diving in shallow water (up to ten feed deep). Gauthier, makes no mention of Buffleheads’ dabbling from the surface. He writes “all food acquired solely through diving.” These Buffleheads are apparently an exception to that rule.