#aythya

Canvasback (Aythya valisineria), male, family Anatidae, order Anseriformes

Breeds across parts of Alaska, western Canada, and the NW US.

Winters over much of the US and Mexico.

A male common pochard (Aythya ferina) in Norfolk, England

Tufted Duck by Melissa McCarthy

Lucky ducks: Once thought extinct, rare pochards take steps toward recovery

One of the world’s rarest birds, once thought to be extinct, successfully bred in the wild late last year. The crop of ducklings marks a victory for conservation groups that have been working for more than a decade to save the species.

In November, conservationists celebrated the appearance of 12 Madagascar pochard (Aythya innotata) ducklings on Lake Sofia in northern Madagascar. They had introduced a set of young adult pochards there in December 2018 but did not expect them to reproduce so quickly. Diving ducks normally don’t breed until they are 2 years old.

“We were very surprised and excited to have chicks just one year after introducing the ducks,” Felix Razafindrajao, a wetlands manager for Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, a group based on Jersey in the British Isles, told Mongabay. In addition to the 12 ducklings, which came in two broods, there are also eight pochard eggs in the marshes that should hatch in the next few weeks, he said.

The pochard was once common in Madagascar’s highlands, but the population declined rapidly in the mid-20th century. Besides one male found in 1991, there were no confirmed sightings between 1970 and 2006, when a scientist from U.S conservation group the Peregrine Fund happened to spot a few of the ducks in a volcanic lake in northern Madagascar.

Decades-long efforts to find the duck through surveys and public campaigns had, it turned out, been too geographically restricted. The search had focused on the center of the high plateau, and especially the Lake Alaotra region, where the pochard, known locally as fotsimaso (“white eyes”), was once common. But the duck was in the far fringes of the high plateau.

“Everybody was looking for the duck in the high plateau but they forgot about the high plateau in the northwest,” Richard Lewis, Durrell’s country director, told Mongabay.

The rediscovered pochards were in fact living in a mile-high lake, surrounded by what Lewis called a “fabulous bit of forest up in the middle of nowhere,” where there was little deforestation or rice cultivation. The Bemanevika site, some 32 to 40 kilometers (20 to 25 miles) northwest of the town of Bealanana, is now a protected area, having received that status partly because of the pochard’s presence. The site includes four shallow lakes, but the pochards usually stay on the one where they were found and breed in its papyrus marshes.