Date: 4/21/24 1:31 pm From: Terry Bronson <birdsbybronson...> Subject: Hooded Mergansers with ducklings in Wood County
Call me flabbergasted. This morning, April 21, I encountered not 1, but 2, broods of Hooded Merganser ducklings in Wood County at the Southern Highway Wetlands, a swampy area at Mineral Wells, WV on the east side of I-77 about 0.2 mile south of WV Route 14, viewable from Old WV Route 21. I have found this species at this location during April for the last 3 years.
One brood had 3 very small recently-hatched ducklings. The other had 12 somewhat-larger ducklings. Both were being shepherded by a hen; a male was nearby. I attempted to get photos, but the birds were distant, there were many intervening dead trees and logs, it was a gloomy day, and the birds' brownish plumage blended in with the muddy water, so I was unsuccessful.
The Second Atlas of Breeding Birds in West Virginia shows only a handful of breeding records in the Allegheny Mountains. Cornell University's Birds of the World indicates the species does not breed in this area, though apparently it did in the time of John James Audubon in the early 1800s.
I did find a few 20th Century records in eBird, where there are a couple of old records in Mason County reported in the Brooks Bird Club "The Redstart" on May 19, 1956 at Point Pleasant (most likely at McClintic WMA) and on May 6, 1961 at McClintic--both of 8 juveniles.
There is also a record of 7 juveniles with an adult female at Ashton in Mason County from May 3-21, 1981, reported in "Birds of the Lower Ohio River Valley in West Virginia."
This is an exciting development, and possibly unprecedented in the modern era for this area of the state.
