Hello everyone. I photographed a female Common Merganser on a recent canoe trip, and looking at my photos, noticed the bill looked very irregular. Does anybody know what this is? It would be interesting to see similar photos. Fortunately, the bird seemed okay aside from the bill.
Raymond, I've seen a couple ducks with similar bills. A bird guy at the zoo told me that any bird can have a damaged bill from genetic defects, injury, breaks, trauma, etc. The ones with gentic defects who survive - like this one, possibly - breed and can pass on the defect.
As always, nature determines that only the strongest survive.
This one looks odd, but apparently is catching enough fish to survive well.
I'll be interested to see what others share about this, too.
Sandy r
Posted by Ron Bielefeld on September 24, 2009 at 9:36 AM
Of course, no one but the bird knows what caused this misaligned bill, but it sure is not normal. I believe Sandy is probably right. This looks like a genetic defect or an injury that happened very early in this bird's life. I have seen so many injuries among so many species of birds, it always amazes me how tough wild birds are and have to be to survive. This bird looks like it is doing fine and from the looks of its bill this is not a bad situation for it. Just a bit out of line. I have seen birds with half their upper or lower manible gone and still surviving.
Posted by Jim DeWitt on September 24, 2009 at 2:23 PM
In Alaska, over the last 15 years, we've had a lot of bill deformity reports, mostly in Black-capped Chickadees, but in other species as well. Colleen Handel of the USGS has done an immense amount of research on the cause. But she has been unable to identify a specific reason for the bill deformations. Based upon blood tests, it's not a known environmental contaminant. She is now exploring whether it is some kind of synergistic effect from two or more causes.
Posted by Mia McPherson on September 24, 2009 at 4:12 PM
Raymond,
I've seen a few deformed bills since I began to take my avian photography seriously (ok, more seriously) but not many I have seen were of the same species.
Here is a Northern Mockingbird with a deformed bill, taken in Hillsborough County, FL in May of this year. I took the shots because of the deformity.
Discussion
4 repliesRaymond
As always, nature determines that only the strongest survive.
This one looks odd, but apparently is catching enough fish to survive well.
I'll be interested to see what others share about this, too.
Sandy r
I've seen a few deformed bills since I began to take my avian photography seriously (ok, more seriously) but not many I have seen were of the same species.
Here is a Northern Mockingbird with a deformed bill, taken in Hillsborough County, FL in May of this year. I took the shots because of the deformity.