{"id":139526,"date":"2025-02-08T02:37:14","date_gmt":"2025-02-08T08:37:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/?p=139526"},"modified":"2025-07-07T12:05:25","modified_gmt":"2025-07-07T17:05:25","slug":"drake-lesser-scaup-on-the-great-salt-lake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2025\/02\/08\/drake-lesser-scaup-on-the-great-salt-lake\/","title":{"rendered":"Drake Lesser Scaup On The Great Salt Lake"},"content":{"rendered":"

This morning, I’m sharing two winter drake Lesser Scaup photos I took three years ago today from the causeway to Antelope Island State Park in Utah.<\/p>\n

\"DrakeDrake Lesser Scaup shaking off after bathing \u2013 Nikon D500, f7.1, 1\/2500, ISO 640, +0.7 V, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light<\/span><\/p>\n

I remember that morning feeling especially wintery, with a frigid North wind blowing off the hypersaline Great Salt Lake.<\/p>\n

There were thousands of ducks of many species on the small area of open water near the bridge just before the island.<\/p>\n

Among them were quite a few Lesser Scaup, a diving duck species I don\u2019t have many photos of. Because of that, I focused on the scaup quite a bit.<\/p>\n

This male Lesser Scaup had just finished bathing when I zeroed in on him to take photos. He certainly gave me some nice poses!<\/p>\n

\"WinterWinter drake Lesser Scaup on the Great Salt Lake \u2013 Nikon D500, f7.1, 1\/2500, ISO 640, +0.7 V, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light<\/span><\/p>\n

I’m tickled that I can continue photographing Lesser Scaup<\/span><\/a> here in Arkansas and Oklahoma, along with Greater Scaup too.<\/p>\n

Greater and Lesser Scaup do look similar and identifying them can be tricky. Check this out for help with ID: Help With Drake Scaup Identification<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Maybe I’ll finally take my dream photos of both species soon, after the weather clears up, hopefully.<\/p>\n

I’ll see!<\/p>\n

Life is<\/em> good.<\/p>\n

Mia<\/p>\n

Click here<\/span><\/a> to see more of my Lesser Scaup photos plus facts and information about this species.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This morning, I’m sharing two winter drake Lesser Scaup photos I took three years ago today from the causeway to Antelope Island State Park in Utah.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":139521,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[511,27,1022,2681,26],"tags":[4004,2682,4373,464,4753,4483,4005,5993,4564,4062,12629,6400,6401,14806,3996,2063,373],"class_list":["post-139526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-antelope-island-state-park","category-avian","category-davis-county-utah","category-lesser-scaups","category-utah","tag-adult","tag-aythya-affinis","tag-bathing","tag-causeway","tag-diving-ducks","tag-drake","tag-great-salt-lake","tag-hypersaline-lake","tag-lesser-scaup","tag-male","tag-post-bath","tag-scaup","tag-scaups","tag-shaking-off","tag-water","tag-waterfowl","tag-winter"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t