Diving Ducks
Loch Fitty. That was the place for a varied bag. I well remember a day, quite a few years ago, when I had invited WAGBI (as the BASC then was) to hold one of their famous wildfowling courses at the duck shoot which I rented at Loch Fitty near Dunfermline.
All the dignitaries were there - Arthur Cadman, Bernie Barker, Allan Allison, et al. Quite unlike any wildfowling course that has been held since that date, I think that the participants really got their money's worth in terms of the sheer weight of expertise which was available to them.
The crowning glory was morning flight on the Saturday when the students were each dropped off by motor boat at a hide and given an experienced fowler as a tutor. If my memory serves me correctly, Loch Fitty had not excelled itself that season but, on the morning of the wildfowling course, it made amends. After a couple of hours of furious shooting the students were picked up by the boats and proudly laid out a bag which contained mallard, teal, wigeon, shoveler, gadwall, tuftie, goldeneye, pochard and coot (to say nothing of a couple of white ducks and a large Canada goose!)
Ignoring the coot and the hybrids, the bag was carefully carried back to the hotel to augment Allan Allison's superb set of study skins in a wildfowl identification tutorial.
All wildfowlers are familiar with the three main quarry species of duck. Whether they encounter plump mallard on a well-fed flight pond, thrill to the haunting whistle of wigeon under the moon or watch a tight-knit pack of teal rising and dipping in unison above an estuarine tideline, they know well the habits and habitat of their quarry and appreciate both the sporting and culinary qualities of each of the three species.
Less well known, perhaps, are the three varieties of diving duck which turned up at Loch Fitty that morning and which, to greater or lesser extent, can provide a fair proportion of the fowler's sport. Pochard, tufted duck and goldeneye are certainly worth the sportsman's attention in certain situations.
POCHARD
In full breeding plumage the male pochard is a striking bird displaying a
red-brown head, black breast and throat and slate-grey back. The bill is blue-grey with a
black tip and the legs are dark grey. In eclipse plumage, the red eye of the male
distinguishes it from the dull brown female.
About 200 pairs of pochard breed in Britain while the winter population is estimated to contain about 40,000 birds with some large concentrations on gravel pits and reservoirs.
The pochard feeds predominantly on water plants for which it dives in water up to 10 feet deep. This vegetable diet is probably the reason why it is the most palatable of all the diving duck and, as such, it is a worthwhile quarry for the wildfowler. Added to its eating qualities, it is also a very fast flyer and can provide testing sport.
In hard weather, when inland waters may be frozen for several weeks, the pochard tends to move to the coast and feed on estuarine molluscs and crustaceans. At such times its culinary value is much reduced.
TUFTED DUCK
The tufted duck was covered in Know your Quarry in the last issue of Wildfowling
so I'll not waste time describing it again. It is, however, one of the most common diving
ducks on the quarry list.
When feeding inland the flesh of the tuftie can be reasonably palatable but I would hesitate to eat one which had been shot below the sea wall. This factor, together with the fact that the longshore gunner may have great difficulty in distinguishing a tufted duck from a protected scaup, probably means that it is unwise to lift a gun to the species below high water mark. On inland waters, however, the bird can give worthwhile sport.
GOLDENEYE
The little goldeneye is the least common of the diving quarry and the mature male
has an iridescent green head with a prominent white patch between bill and eye. The back
is black and the neck and underparts white or light grey. The female has a mainly grey
body with a chestnut-brown head. As the name suggests, the eyes are golden yellow and the
short bill and sloping forehead give the head a distinctive triangular look.
Only a few goldeneye breed in Britain but up to 12,000 birds migrate from western USSR and northern Scandinavia to spend the winter months with us. The duck has a diet of molluscs, fish fry, some vegetable matter and crustaceans which means that birds shot on the saltmarsh are likely to taste something akin to par-boiled seaweed mixed with fishmeal. Goldeneye from inland waters should be more palatable, however, and will probably go well with a strong curry sauce.
