{"id":8223,"date":"2021-02-18T18:33:01","date_gmt":"2021-02-18T23:33:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/flgcc.com\/?p=8223"},"modified":"2026-01-26T10:56:33","modified_gmt":"2026-01-26T15:56:33","slug":"diving-ducks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/2021\/02\/18\/diving-ducks\/florida\/","title":{"rendered":"Diving Ducks"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Tis the season for our northern visitors. I&#8217;m not talking about the mass migration of &#8220;snowbirds&#8221;. I&#8217;m talking about waterfowl. We have huge numbers of ducks just about everywhere. One small lake behind Costco has become the winter home for ring-necked ducks and lesser scaup. They look very similar. The main differentiating feature is the bill. The ring-necked duck ironically has a white ring on their blue-gray bill while the scaup&#8217;s bill is completely light blue. The males&#8217; heads have an iridescence element that changes color in different light. At times their heads have a purple shimmer and other times they shine with a dark green look.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" src=\"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/210208-4-lesser-scaup-drake-with-purple-head-looking-back.jpg\" alt=\"Lesser Scaup Drake With Purple Head Looking Back\" class=\"wp-image-98853\" srcset=\"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/210208-4-lesser-scaup-drake-with-purple-head-looking-back.jpg 2560w, https:\/\/flgcc.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/210208-4-lesser-scaup-drake-with-purple-head-looking-back-900x600.jpg 900w, https:\/\/flgcc.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/210208-4-lesser-scaup-drake-with-purple-head-looking-back-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/flgcc.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/210208-4-lesser-scaup-drake-with-purple-head-looking-back-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/flgcc.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/210208-4-lesser-scaup-drake-with-purple-head-looking-back-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/flgcc.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/210208-4-lesser-scaup-drake-with-purple-head-looking-back-2048x1366.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>Male Lesser Scaup Duck with a Purple Head Looking Back<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n\n\n<p>The ducks like the Costco lake because it has a good crop of snails which they devour quickly. If we&#8217;re near one of the snail beds, the birds are easy to approach and photograph.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n<p>A few more pictures from this journey are featured below. For a larger selection of photos, go to the galleries listed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/gary-walker-photography\/galleries\/nature\/birds\/diving-ducks\/\">Diving Ducks<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Tis the season for our northern visitors. I&#8217;m not talking about the mass migration of &#8220;snowbirds&#8221;. I&#8217;m talking about waterfowl. We have huge numbers of ducks just about everywhere. One small lake behind Costco has become the winter home for ring-necked ducks and lesser scaup. They look very similar. The main differentiating feature is the&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":98854,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2743],"tags":[2774],"class_list":["post-8223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-florida","tag-nature"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/210208-4-lesser-scaup-male-swallowing-snail.jpg?ver","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8223"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8223\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":109169,"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8223\/revisions\/109169"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flgcc.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}