Northern Shoveler

Mclean's Conservation Area, Ontario, Canada, Mar 21, 2022.


In a flooded field next to the road, they didn't come close but they didn't swim away either.
They always remind me of clowns for some reason.
Spatula clypeata
The bill of the Northern Shoveler is big (about 2.5 inches long) and shaped like a shovel, but that odd-shaped bill also has about 110 fine projections (called lamellae) along the edges that act like a colander, filtering out tiny crustaceans, seeds, and aquatic invertebrates from the water.
Source - Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

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