King Eider

Table

King Eider – Accepted
1. 16 Dec 1933	HY	Tomales Bay MRN	1984-158	10	ph., CAS 1659, one of three reported
2. 20 Nov 1940		Eel R. mouth HUM	1990-059	14	ph., Humboldt County Fairgrounds life mount
3. 24 Nov 1940	HY	Eureka HUM	1986-013	14	ph., CMEHS 961
4. 03 Feb–16 Mar 1958		Monterey MTY	1985-066	10
5. 21–26 Mar 1959	SY	Pebble Beach MTY	1984-199	10
and 24–25 Jun 1959		Monterey MTY
6. mid Feb–26 Aug 1961	SY	Moss Landing MTY	1986-094	14
7. 17 Sep 1961	HY	Bodega Bay SON	1986-095	11
8. 24 Dec 1969–07 Mar 1970		Monterey MTY	1977-127	4	ph., Roberson (1980), see records not submitted
9. 22 Nov 1973–28 Jan 1974	HY	Malibu LA	1974-002	3	ph.
10. 24 Nov 1973–27 Apr 1974	HY	Monterey MTY	1974-024	3	ph., AB 28:100, Roberson (1980)
11. 19 Nov 1975	HY	Eel R. mouth HUM	1983-025	8	HSU 3568
12. 30 Apr–07 May 1978		Año Nuevo State Reserve SM	1978-092	5,10	ph.
13. 13–28 Nov 1980	HY	Abbotts Lagoon MRN	1980-228	7	ph., AB 35:220
14. 04 Dec 1982–25 Jan 1983	AHY	Imperial Beach/Coronado SD	1982-109	8	Fig. 194, ph., AB 37:338, Unitt (2004)
15. 18–23 Dec 1982	HY	Moss Landing MTY	1988-112	14	ph.
16. 18 Dec 1982–31 Jan 1983		Huntington Beach ORA	1983-003	8
17. 19 Dec 1982–07 May 1983	HY	Emeryville ALA	1983-007	8	Fig. 24, ph.
18. 26 Dec 1982–16 Jan 1983		Newport Beach ORA	1983-052	8	ph.
19. 23 Jul–18 Sep 1983		Ventura VEN	1983-056	8	ph., AB 37:1027
20. 18 Dec 1983		Richmond CC	1986-098	11
and 29 Jun–? Aug 1984			1984-156	10
and 04–21 Sep 1985			1985-120	10
21. 28 Oct 1985–17 Feb 1986		Morro Bay SLO	1986-072	11	ph.
and 12 Jan 1986		Montaña de Oro State Park SLO	1986-081	11
22. 12 Jan 1986		Moss Landing MTY	1986-171	11	ph.
23. 29–31 Mar 1986		Pt. Saint George DN	1986-208	11
24. 27 Apr–15 Jun 1986	SY	Salinas R. mouth MTY	1986-229	11	ph.
25. 21 Nov–21 Dec 1986		Crescent City DN	1987-046	12	ph.
26. 09–29 Dec 1988	HY	Moss Landing MTY	1988-259	13	ph.
27. 29 Apr–07 May 1989	SY	Pomponio State Beach SM	1989-088	13
28. 30 Aug 1989–21 Apr 1990	ASY	Pt. Reyes MRN	1989-133	15	ph., AB 44:156, AB 44:323
29. 18 Mar 1991		Monterey MTY	1991-052	16
and 30 Jun–14 Sep 1991		Moss Landing MTY	1991-101	16
30. 18 Oct 1991		Pt. Reyes MRN	1991-215	17
31. 13–31 Dec 1991	HY	Seal Beach ORA	1991-213	17	AB 46:315
and 09–17 Jan 1992		Belmont Shore LA			see records not submitted
and 14–31 May 1992		Redondo Beach LA	1994-130	20	Fig. 195, ph.
32. 06 Jan–01 Feb 1992		King Salmon HUM	1992-109	18
and 12 Nov 1992–25 Mar 1993			1993-040	18
33. 28 Mar–04 Apr 1993		Año Nuevo State Reserve SM	1993-096	19	ph.
34. 23–28 Dec 1995		Laguna Beach/Huntington Bch. ORA	1998-014	24
35. 23 Dec 2000–21 Mar 2001	HY	Pt. Reyes MRN	2000-164	26	ph., video
36. 13 Dec 2003		San Francisco SF	2003-196	29	ph.
King Eider – Not accepted, identification not established
10 Nov 1944	2	Willits MEN	1989-142	14
17–18 Apr 1983		Pismo Beach SLO	1987-322	14
26 Dec 1995		Ocean Beach SF	1997-030	22	ph.
29 Jan–16 Feb 1997		Pt. Reyes MRN	1997-061	24
King Eider – Not submitted
winter 1879/1880		“off Blackpoint” SF		14	Henshaw (1880)
	Suisun Marsh SOL		14	Dawson (1923)
16 Dec 1933	2	Tomales Bay, MRN			Moffitt (1940a), see table entry 1
23 Apr 1941		Humboldt Bay HUM			Eureka High School life mount, Harris (2006)
29–30 May 1970		Monterey MTY			AFN 24:639, see table entry 8
and 08 Aug 1970					AFN 24:712
and 01 Jan–28 Mar 1971				4	Roberson (2002); this date span listed as accepted by Luther (1980) but no documentation was submitted
and ? Jan–11 Mar 1972					Roberson (2002)
and 21 Mar 1973					Roberson (2002)
26 Oct 1973		Bolinas Lagoon MRN		14	AB 28:100, “found dying”
02 Nov 1973		Bolinas Lagoon MRN		14	AB 28:100, found dead
12 Dec 1982		Fort Pt. SF			AB 37:333
29 Jan–early Feb 1983		San Pedro LA		14	AB 37:338
08 Jul 1983		Long Beach LA			AB 37:1027
29 Dec 1990		Monterey MTY			Roberson (2002)
04–05 Mar 1992		Hermosa Beach LA			AB 46:314, see table entry 31

Figures

Figure 23. Distribution of 36 King Eiders accepted through 2003. Six out of every ten have been found along the coast between Sonoma County and Monterey Bay. Presumably reflecting differences in observer coverage, more records come from the state’s southern third than from the northern third.

Figure 24. This first-year female King Eider was photographed on 30 December 1982 in Emeryville, Alameda County, where it was present from 19 December 1982 to 7 May 1983. This bird’s bill shape and V-shaped flank markings rule out a female Common Eider (1983-007; Rick LeBadour).

Image879.TIF

Figure 194. This King Eider, photographed on 5 December 1982 at Imperial Beach in San Diego County, was a second-year male as judged by bill morphology and dark feathering in the secondary coverts. The species still has not been found farther south along the Pacific coast (1982-109; Richard E. Webster).

Figure 195. The rigors of a winter and spring spent well south of the normal range show in the tattered plumage of this second-spring male King Eider, photographed on 28 May 1992 at Redondo Beach, Los Angeles County (1994-130; Jonathan K. Alderfer).

King Eider

KING EIDER Somateria spectabilis (Linnaeus, 1758)

Accepted: 36 (88%)	Treated in Appendix H: no
Not accepted: 5	CBRC review: all records
Not submitted/reviewed: 13	Color images: see Figures

This duck is a holarctic breeder. Old World birds winter along the coasts of Greenland, Iceland, Scandinavia, and Kamchatka; New World birds winter rarely on the Great Lakes and along the Atlantic coast to Virginia, casually south to Florida and along the Gulf coast to Texas. In the West, the species winters in the southern Bering Sea, among the Aleutian and Shumagin Islands, and east to south-central Alaska. Vagrants occur casually along the Pacific coast south to southern California and accidentally in the continent’s interior.

A first-winter female King Eider collected on 16 December 1933 “from a group of three” at Tomales Bay in Marin County (Moffitt 1940a) provided the first verifiable record for California. Reports from “off Blackpoint, San Francisco,” San Francisco County, during winter 1879/1880 (Henshaw 1880) and from Suisun Marsh, Solano County, 15 October 1902–1 February 1903 were not documented (Dawson 1923). The accepted records, all from coastal areas, are concentrated in the middle third of the state (Erickson and Terrill 1996; Figure 23). Birds have summered on Monterey and San Francisco Bays and in Ventura County, but the species is mainly a late fall and winter vagrant to the state, with about 75% having occurred between 18 October and 4 April, often among scoter flocks.

Mlodinow (1999b) noted a decrease in this species’ frequency as a vagrant along the Pacific coast starting in 1987, a negative trend that concords with a 56% twenty-year decline (1976–1996) in the counts of King Eiders migrating past Pt. Barrow, northern Alaska (Suydam et al. 2000).