The velvet scoter (''Melanitta fusca'') is a large

sea duck The sea ducks (Mergini) are a tribe of the duck subfamily of birds, the Anatinae. The taxonomy of this group is incomplete. Some authorities separate the group as a subfamily, while others remove some genera. Most species within the group spend ...

, which breeds over the far north of

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

and the

Palearctic The Palearctic or Palaearctic is a biogeographic realm of the Earth, the largest of eight. Confined almost entirely to the Eastern Hemisphere, it stretches across Europe and Asia, north of the foothills of the Himalayas, and North Africa. Th ...

west of the

Yenisey The Yenisey or Yenisei ( ; , ) is the list of rivers by length, fifth-longest river system in the world, and the largest to drain into the Arctic Ocean. Rising in Mungaragiyn-gol in Mongolia, it follows a northerly course through Lake Baikal a ...

basin. The genus name is derived from

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

''melas'' "black" and ''netta'' "duck". The species name is from the

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

''fuscus'' "dusky brown".

Taxonomy

The velvet scoter was formally described in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné,#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. was a Swedish biologist and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming o ...

in the tenth edition of his ''

Systema Naturae ' (originally in Latin written ' with the Orthographic ligature, ligature æ) is one of the major works of the Sweden, Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the syste ...

'' under the

binomial name In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin grammatical forms, altho ...

''Anas fusca''. Linnaeus specified the type locality as European seas but restricted this to the Swedish coast in 1761. The velvet scoter is now one of six species placed in the genus ''

Melanitta The scoters are stocky seaducks in the genus ''Melanitta''. The drakes are mostly black and have swollen bills, the females are brown. They breed in the far north of Europe, Asia, and North America, and winter further south in temperate zones o ...

'' that was introduced in 1822 by the German zoologist

Friedrich Boie Friedrich Boie (4 June 1789 – 3 March 1870) was a German entomologist, herpetologist, ornithologist, and lawyer.Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). ''The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Universi ...

. The genus name combines the

''melas'' meaning "black" and ''netta'' meaning "duck". The specific epithet ''fusca'' is from

''fuscus'' meaning "dusky", "black" or "brown". The species is considered to be

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unisp ...

: no

subspecies In Taxonomy (biology), biological classification, subspecies (: subspecies) is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (Morphology (biology), morpholog ...

are recognised. The velvet scooter was formerly considered to be

conspecific Biological specificity is the tendency of a characteristic such as a behavior or a biochemical variation to occur in a particular species. Biochemist Linus Pauling stated that "Biological specificity is the set of characteristics of living organism ...

with the

white-winged scoter The white-winged scoter (''Melanitta deglandi'') is a large Merginae, sea duck. The genus name is derived from Ancient Greek ''melas'' "black" and ''netta'' "duck". The species name commemorates French ornithologist Côme-Damien Degland. Descri ...

(''Melanitta deglandi'') of North America and Stejneger's scoter (''Melanitta stejnegeri'') of eastern Siberia and northwest Mongolia. Melanitta fusca MWNH 1019

Velvet Scoter from the Crossley ID Guide Britain and Ireland

Description

The velvet scoter is in length and has a wingspan of . It is a relatively large sea duck with a thick neck, a long broad bill and a pointed tail. The plumage of the male is glossy black with large white wing patches and small white patches behind the eye. The bill is partly orange. The female is similar to the male but lacks the gloss on the feathers and is duller and browner.

Distribution

They breed in northern Europe, from Norway to the Yenisey River in central Siberia and also northeast

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a landlocked country primarily in Central Asia, with a European Kazakhstan, small portion in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the Kazakhstan–Russia border, north and west, China to th ...

. It winters farther south in

temperate In geography, the temperate climates of Earth occur in the middle latitudes (approximately 23.5° to 66.5° N/S of the Equator), which span between the tropics and the polar regions of Earth. These zones generally have wider temperature ran ...

zones,

as far south as

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-west coast of continental Europe, consisting of the countries England, Scotland, and Wales. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the List of European ...

, and on the

Black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

and

Caspian Sea The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, described as the List of lakes by area, world's largest lake and usually referred to as a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it lies between Europe and Asia: east of the Caucasus, ...

. Small numbers reach France and northern Spain. It forms large flocks on suitable coastal waters. These are tightly packed, and the birds tend to take off together. Lake Tabatskuri in the region of Samtskhe-Javakheti,

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States Georgia may also refer to: People and fictional characters * Georgia (name), a list of pe ...

, holds the last breeding population of velvet scoters in the Caucasus. Studies into this population in 2017–2018 found 25–35 pairs at the lake, with substantially fewer nesting. Competition for nesting locations, predation on velvet scoters by gulls, and disturbance by fishing activities were identified as contributing factors to reproductivity rates that were considered as "poor".

Behaviour

Breeding

The lined

nest A nest is a structure built for certain animals to hold Egg (biology), eggs or young. Although nests are most closely associated with birds, members of all classes of vertebrates and some invertebrates construct nests. They may be composed of ...

is built on the ground close to the sea, lakes or rivers, in

woodland A woodland () is, in the broad sense, land covered with woody plants (trees and shrubs), or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the '' plurale tantum'' woods), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunli ...

tundra In physical geography, a tundra () is a type of biome where tree growth is hindered by frigid temperatures and short growing seasons. There are three regions and associated types of tundra: #Arctic, Arctic, Alpine tundra, Alpine, and #Antarctic ...

. The nest is built by the female and is placed in thick vegetation and is well concealed. The clutch is typically 7–9 creamy white

egg An egg is an organic vessel grown by an animal to carry a possibly fertilized egg cell (a zygote) and to incubate from it an embryo within the egg until the embryo has become an animal fetus that can survive on its own, at which point the ...

s which measure . Beginning after the last egg is laid, they are incubated for 27–28 days by the female. The eggs are covered with down when the female is off the nest. The young are

precocial Precocial species in birds and mammals are those in which the young are relatively mature and mobile from the moment of birth or hatching. They are normally nidifugous, meaning that they leave the nest shortly after birth or hatching. Altricial ...

and

nidifugous In biology, nidifugous ( , ) organisms are those that leave the nest shortly after hatching or birth. The term is derived from Latin ''nidus'' for "nest" and ''fugere'', meaning "to flee". The terminology is most often used to describe birds and w ...

and feed themselves. They are cared for by the female and become independent after 30–40 days. They first breed when aged two years.

Food and feeding

This duck dives for

crustacean Crustaceans (from Latin meaning: "those with shells" or "crusted ones") are invertebrate animals that constitute one group of arthropods that are traditionally a part of the subphylum Crustacea (), a large, diverse group of mainly aquatic arthrop ...

s and

mollusc Mollusca is a phylum of protostome, protostomic invertebrate animals, whose members are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 76,000 extant taxon, extant species of molluscs are recognized, making it the second-largest animal phylum ...

Conservation status

The velvet scoter is listed as Vulnerable by the

International Union for Conservation of Nature The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the stat ...

(IUCN). It is one of the species to which the ''Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds'' (

AEWA The Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds, or African-Eurasian Waterbird Agreement (AEWA), is an independent international treaty developed under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Programme's Convent ...

) applies.

References

Sources

External links

Velvet Scoter
RSPB {{Taxonbar, from=Q201300

velvet scoter The velvet scoter (''Melanitta fusca'') is a large Merginae, sea duck, which breeds over the far north of Europe and the Palearctic west of the Yenisey basin. The genus name is derived from Ancient Greek ''melas'' "black" and ''netta'' "duck". Th ...

Birds of Scandinavia Birds of Russia Birds of Georgia (country) Birds of Azerbaijan