Black-bellied Whislting Duck

On May 9th a Black-bellied Whistling Duck was discovered by P. A. Buckley in Watermill on eastern Long Island. As with many stray waterfowl, its difficult or impossible to determine whether the bird escaped from captivity, or is a genuine vagrant.

Although they regularly occur in the southern portions of Arizona, Texas and in a few locations in Florida, there are scattered records throughout the US, including the northeast. There is at least one previous occurence of Black-bellied Whistling Duck in NYS, but of course the origin of that bird is also unknown.

These digiscoped photos were taken by Mike Cooper on May 10th, 2002.