Ferruginous Duck

The ferruginous duck, also known as the ferruginous pochard, common white-eye or white-eyed pochard, is a medium-sized diving duck native to the Palearctic. The breeding male is rich, dark chestnut on the head, breast and flanks with contrasting pure white undertail coverts, and the white belly and underwing patch are visible in flight. Females are duller and browner, the male has a yellow eye and the female a dark one (Wikipedia, general species account).

Eggs are laid from late April or early May in a nest on the ground close to water, or sometimes a floating nest among emergent vegetation, and are incubated for 25–27 days; the fledging period is 55–60 days. The breeding range runs from Iberia and the Maghreb east to western Mongolia and south to Arabia, though it is now scarce and localised in the west. It winters around the Mediterranean Basin and the Black Sea, with smaller numbers reaching sub-Saharan Africa via the Nile Valley (Wikipedia, general species account).