Female Lesser Scaup?

[smittyone@cox.net]

Seen yesterday at Loess Bluffs NWR in NW Missouri.  Is these female Lesser Scaup?  I only saw a pair of them, and no adult male Scaup anywhere.  I did note a diifference in eye color between the two.

[IKLland]

They’re both Lesser. I believe they’re both females and the eye color difference may be just variation or lighting. If you look closely, they’re both yellowish. Neither is an immature male because those wouldn’t have the white in front of the bill.

[Avery]

I agree with Lesser for both

7 minutes ago, IKLland said:

Neither is an immature male because those wouldn’t have the white in front of the bill.

Immature scaup of both sexes have white at the base of the bill. Females have more extensive and defined patches, and males have much smaller ones, which get even smaller with age. That said, I agree that these are both females based on the body feathers.

Eye color gets lighter with age, and according to BoTW there are slight color differences between Greater and Lesser depending on their age of the bird. 

[IKLland]

3 minutes ago, Avery said:

I agree with Lesser for both

Immature scaup of both sexes have white at the base of the bill. Females have more extensive and defined patches, and males have much smaller ones, which get even smaller with age. That said, I agree that these are both females based on the body feathers.

Eye color gets lighter with age, and according to BoTW there are slight color differences between Greater and Lesser depending on their age of the bird. 

Hmm, interesting. I was just looking at the photos on Merlin and the immature male photo doesn’t show any white.

 

[Avery]

17 minutes ago, IKLland said:

Hmm, interesting. I was just looking at the photos on Merlin and the immature male photo doesn’t show any white.

 

Oop, looks like I removed the part that said it can disappear when I was removing all the plumage names and times of year. 

What I was trying to say the immature males can have white on their face, but often don’t.