Smew

How to identify

Field marks

1. Male snowy-white, with a sharp black-and-white contrast in flight
2. Female has a gray body with a chestnut forehead and crown
3. Female has a white chin and cheeks, and black lores
4. Bill tip hooked, bill edges serrated

Male, female and young

Female and immature male gray with a chestnut forehead and crown; male molts into eclipse plumage in late summer and autumn, resembling female but with more white on the wings.

Where and when it's recorded

Smew has been recorded at 908 of the 8,171 birding hotspots we track, in 54 countries and regions.

Records by month Northern Hemisphere

Where it's recorded most

1. Rutland WaterUnited Kingdom905 records
2. Amwell HMWT NRUnited Kingdom880 records
3. Ekeby våtmarkSweden705 records

Countries and regions with the most records

United KingdomChinaFinlandSwedenJapanSouth KoreaGermanyPoland

eBird records via GBIF up to 2024-12-31. A record means someone listed it; more records partly mean more birders, not more birds.

About

The smew (Mergellus albellus) is a species of duck and is the only living member of the genus Mergellus. The genus is closely related to Mergus and is sometimes included in it; genetic studies have shown that it is the sister taxon to Mergus and Lophodytes. The smew has hybridised with the common goldeneye (Bucephala clangula).

Excerpt from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0 · authors · Read more on Wikipedia

Questions