Male/Female Mallard - colours?

[welshgold]

Male Mallard

Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L IS, ISO 400, f4, 1/250s.

Female Mallard

Canon EOS 7D, Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L IS, ISO 400, f4, 1/320s.

Amazing that the male is more colourful than the female - shouldn't it be the other way around allowing her to attract other mallards?

[htcdude]

Lovely shots, clever ducks walking on water


I think someone mentioned before, the females are usually more drab in species. Not sure who said that though

Nige

[Synn]

I think the females are generally more drab so that they can hide when sitting on the nest

[PentaxPete]

Found this hybrid Mallard - even more colourful with his bright white breast feathers

[PentaxPete]

Originally Posted by Synn

I think the females are generally more drab so that they can hide when sitting on the nest

Thats always amazed me as to why some are drab and some are not. If sitting on the nest and being drab coloured helps with being hard to see, i wonder why nature invented Swans, Great Crested Grebes and plenty of other birds where the Male and Female look virtually identical, and colourful?

Nature is strange

[Tursiops2]

Originally Posted by welshgold

Amazing that the male is more colourful than the female - shouldn't it be the other way around allowing her to attract other mallards?

Female ducks are drab (if you can really call such subtle and delicate markings "drab") to camouflage them when sitting on eggs. The males don't incubate, so don't need to be camouflaged, and their ability to survive with such conspicuous plumage is an indication to females of their genetic "fitness" and suitability as a parent. It's the males that attract the females, not the other way round.

This is generally true (there are exceptions) of birds that nest in relatively exposed situations and don't share incubation duties.

T2

[tigertom]

In some species of birds the roles are reversed such as in phalaropes where the are females are nice and bright to attract the males who are drab and are left to sit on the eggs and raise the young whilst the females go of to find more males
MIKE