A few birds from the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.
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Common Eider:Sleeping Bag Bird Common Eider Aangikvak/Metraq How does the Common eider relate to a sleeping bag, you ask? Simple. You see, in the not so distant past, sleeping bags used to be filled with the soft downy feathers of this sea duck. A few still are, but most eider feathers now fill expensive pillows and bed quilts. Only in Iceland is the gathering of eider down still a lucrative business. There, large colonies of 10,000 or more of these wild ducks are closely protected and encouraged in their nesting. It is from the Icelandic language, in fact, that the name “eider” comes. While we’re on the topic of names and downy feathers, the scientific name of this bird is Somateria mollissima, a Greek-Latin combination, meaning, “very soft downy (woolly) body.” In Hooper Bay and Scammon Bay, I was told the Yupik name for the male Common eider is Aangikvak, meaning something like “big two-eyed spirit” bird. This may refer to its white head patches and the way it looms like a spirit out of the foggy dark waters of the Bering Sea. But the name for the duck changes in the Kuskokwim Bay area where it is called Metraq. Many Yupik people also use the moniker Nayangaryaq to refer to the female Common eider. The word literally means, “having the quality of nodding in agreement,” and you’ll understand why she has this name when you watch her for a while (if you can find her). Of the four eider species found in North America, the Common eider is the largest of them all. It is also the most abundant of the eiders, found throughout the circumpolar north. Apart from the nesting season, it is encountered only at sea. I have been lucky enough to run across huge rafts of them while skiing on the edge of the Bering Sea ice during the winter. Once I counted nearly 700 of them near Hooper Bay cruising north on the two mph current. As they swam, they dove for food items that included marine animals, such as clams, fishes, crabs, sea stars, worms and mussels, all of which give its flesh a strong fish flavor. Eiders swallow whole mussels and other shellfish up to two inches long, and the shells are ground into bits by the bird’s powerful gizzard. They can fish deep underwater, as far down as sixty feet, and use their wings to “fly” under the surface. If alarmed while feeding there, they can fly straight out of the water into the air. Like all ducks, they have their own unique calls. While watching and listening to them from the edge of the ice, I heard croaking and groaning sounds mixed with ghostly moans. I learned later the croaks and groans were from females, and the moans were from males in love. After finding mates, Common eiders nest in colonies on the ground near saltwater. The nest is usually located in a shallow depression and is built of seaweeds, mosses, sticks and grasses, then thickly lined around, under and over the eggs with a luxurious layer of fluffy gray downy feathers plucked by the hen from her own body. Only the female incubates the 3-5 pale brown to olive-green eggs. This lasts for approximately 28 days, and as soon as they hatch, the mother duck leads the ducklings to water. When young birds can pick up and leave the nest like this, they are referred to as “precocial.” Barring any unforeseen problems, like hungry Killer whales, within 56 days after leaving the nest the young should be able to fly. Some interesting English common names for the Common eider are: canvasback, black and white coot, laying duck, looby, squam duck, wamp, and Eskimo duck.  |
