TEAL

We took a very short trip to Dinton Pastures again yesterday (as in the changed date and time of this post), near Wokingham, or more specifically Lavell's Lake, where we KNOW Bitterns roost!
No Bitterns,(we were too early in the day - we were visiting the cinema in the early evening), but some wonderful views of other birds.
First up, the Teal.
I remember being transfixed by the adult male Teal's plumage when I was a small boy, visiting my Grandfather in Suffolk. There was a captive (wing-clipped) population there, and I spent hours drawing the Teal when we returned back to his cottage for tea!
A chestnut head with a bottle-green pattern around the eyes, some incredible barring down the flanks (at a distance this just looks plain grey, but look closer, the detail is wonderful), and two very obvious yellow flashes by its rump (Anna noticed this immediately yesterday), make this bird unmistakeable.
The Teal is our smallest duck at 36cmlong and unlike a lot of ducks, takes off vertically from the water like a little harrier jump jet.
Teals also exhibit a bright GREEN speculum (wing flash) making them quite easy to identify in flight, in the right conditions.
We logged TEAL in the little birdwatchers log book in the hide we were sat - (it wasn't logged before even though there were a dozen or so of them, male and females). Teals, in the main, are winter visitors to the UK from Siberia, although some do breed here. I'll never take them for granted - very possibly my favourite UK duck.
NB. Teal are meant to be very tasty also. Our local farmers market sells them sometimes, every fortnight. I think we may just see if they really are that good to eat...!


[photo (c) Arthur Grosset once more. Thanks Arthur]