Keepers’ Corner – Pochard

Carrying on with January’s bird theme for #KeepersCorner I thought I’d try and tempt people out into the cold New Year for a bit of duck-spotting.

The taxidermy specimen shown here is a Pochard. Your chances of seeing one of these in Bucks during summer is very low, however, in winter many pochards fly in to the county to avoid more severe weather further north and east. And the same is true for many other species of duck and so, while in summer you may find mallards and tufted ducks, in winter you may discover teal, wigeon, goldeneyes, shovellers and many more. An added bonus for this time of year is that the more colourful male ducks are in their finest and most distinctive plumage as they look to impress during the approaching breeding season. So why not visit a local lake or canal and see how many different species of duck you can spot this January.