MAY 10, waterfowl: shelduck (visitor)

poetry lyrics:/ Quacked the shelduck, "With no GPS/ We migrate. In high winds, we digress/

From our usual flight-path./ So one dark-stormy-night path,/

We land here, refugees in US/ (They prefer that we leave, that's my guess). 

Authors' Note:  The above photos commemorate the unusual sighting of a shelduck, a handsome European duck species, in Brooklyn, New York, USA, in early May, 2026. This particular bird was noted in the company of native mallard ducks swimming and feeding in a pond at the Prospect Botanical Garden. The bird is distinguished by its red face-plate, longitudinal black body stripes and horizontal brown belly stripe.

Occasionally, Eurasian species like the shelduck are forced off course in their migration southward from Europe to Africa by major storms, and land up along the Atlantic seaboard of the United States; this eventuality was at play here, as particularly bad weather had preceded our visit to New York City at the beginning of May. Attributable to the same storm, You-tube had posted a video of a visit to a Pennsylvania pond where a local duck expert had clinched the unusual sighting.