The phone rang and I picked it up.
Nothing unusual about that.
“Hello,” a voice intoned.
“Hello,” I affirmed.
So far, so good. And while I won’t pretend to remember precisely how the next bit of dialogue progressed, the point of the matter was that the gentleman was a new birder (I knew this because he made it known that he was not a “serious birder”). His avocational and neophyte standing was underscored by his admission that he’d just gone on-line and bought a National Geographic Field Guide. His standing was further certified by his disclosure that he’d just seen a Smew.
I’ve been birding a long time. Birded on every continent. Seen a lot of great birds. Never seen a Smew–a merganserish duck that calls the Old World home and appears somewhat irregularly in North America.
How irregularly? Well, there has never been a New Jersey record.
Comparing these two species you can see how at-a-glance they look similar enough to pose an identification challenge. Knowing a species’ distribution is key to narrowing down the possibilities. Top photo: Long-tailed Duck by Kevin Karlson. Bottom Photo: Smew courtesy of Wikipedia.
“Did you eliminate the possibility of Long-tailed Duck?” I asked.
The answer was: “No.”
“Did you consider the possibility of Hooded Merganser?”
The answer was: “What’s that?”
I suggested he look at the pictures of these common waterfowl species and see whether, possibly, they might bear likeness to the bird he saw.
How do I know that the gentleman didn’t see a Smew? I don’t. There is only one expert on this subject and it’s not me.
But one thing I do know is that beginning birders have a great deal to sort out and that the discipline of seeing birds, noting field marks, remembering those distinguishing characteristics, and linking them to a likeness in a book is a talent that usually takes time to develop.
Finding a Smew right out of the box (before ever hearing of, much less seeing, Long-tailed Ducks or Hooded Mergansers) would constitute an extraordinary bit of good fortune. And while I certainly cannot, and will not say that the gentleman did not see a Smew, I will say that the odds of a beginning birder finding a Smew before their Life Hooded Merganser are only slightly better than being hit by a comet.
But let’s be fair. The guy wasn’t trying to impress me. He was just trying to pin a name to a bird. A bird he gleaned from his guide that was not commonly found here. He wanted confirmation that what seemed unlikely was possible.
Which it is. But standing between unlikely and possible are a lot of impediments labeled “more likely.” These he would have to address.
Which he seemed game to do.
Field guide authors have a lot of very tough choices to make. They want to make their guide comprehensive but they also don’t want to diminish the book’s fundamental purpose which is: guide the user to a correct identification.
Both the National Geographic Society and Kenn Kaufman put Smew in their guides but relegate it to the bottom of the page–in the language of layout and design, a red flag. Several other field guides don’t even include the bird. In the language of layout and design, the equivalent of saying: “no way.”
Which is better? Which is right?
I don’t know. No more than I know what duck the guy had seen. The only thing I know is that if I’d said: “No way, Buster. You were looking at a Hooded Merganser,” I might have been correct, but I would also have been presumptuously wrong.
And as I sit here, writing this, I find myself keeping one ear cocked for the phone.
I’ve never seen anyone hit by a comet, either. There’s a first time for everything.