Last week I saw two young birds perched on logs in a duckweed-carpeted pond at Bear Creek Nature Park. Could they be juveniles? Their feet and beaks did look a bit too large for their slightly disheveled bodies. I hazarded a guess that they were mergansers, but couldn’t find anything like them online or in my bird books. When local birding expert, Ruth Glass, identified them as young Hooded Mergansers (Lophodytes cucullatus), I found I’d been watching some juvenile birds who’d recently been fledgling prodigies!

I can do no better than to quote Cornell Ornithology Lab on this point. (Emphasis below is mine):

“Hooded Merganser ducklings leave their nest cavity within 24 hours of hatching. First, their mother checks the area around the nest and calls to the nestlings from ground level. From inside the nest, the little fluffballs scramble up to the entrance hole and then flutter to the ground, which may be 50 feet or more below them. In some cases they have to walk half a mile or more with their mother to the nearest body of water…Ducklings can dive for food right after leaving the nest, at one day old, though their dives are short and shallow during their first week.”

Now those are impressive baby birds, don’t you think? Check out the photos of the mature Hooded Mergansers at this Cornell Lab link and you’ll see why I couldn’t identify these juveniles. The adults, with their exotic crests,  are pretty glamorous compared to the modestly colored, slightly awkward young birds in my photos below! So glad our parks host these former wunderkinder!

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