On 10 visits to Kellys over the last month I have seen up to 5 Freckled Ducks at one time on the Cygnus loglet. What one does with this species is look for any sign of that male breeding colour. None of the loglet set have shown it. However a single duck occasionally feeding separately on the far side certainly has it. Today that individual approached the loglet in feeding mode but its presence within 2 metres was not tolerated by one FD and it left to roost with another (uncoloured) FD in its preferred spot at the base of the spoonbill tree. At this point one reaches for HANZAB volume 1B, noting again that much of the information on Freckled Ducks is attributed to our own PJ Fullagar and CC Davey. From this one learns that the monogamous BONDS are ‘seasonal and short-term’, and that ROOSTING AND LOAFING ‘invariably occur as unstructured communal congregations’. ‘Typically gregarious, especially outside breeding season [this would be the end of it] and in non-breeding areas [which this is].’ The repeated head-forward challenge suggests possible male rivalry caused by faint hormonal stirrings. Either that or schoolyard cliques are alive and well at the swamp. Incidentally, HANZAB gives a proportion of 93% of males collected in March as having some degree of redness in the bill.
