Widowed Bird Won't Go South for the Winter

türkçe links to original Turkish article

(Hürriyet Newspaper, 26 December 2018)


                      Farmer Tuncer and grieving widow.

A male and female 'angut' (ruddy shellduck) have been coming to the
farm of Hakan Tuncer in Karacalar village, Osmaniye province, for
the past 6 years.  The pair spent summers on Tuncer's farm, made a
nest and then migrated with their young 5,000 kilometers to places
like Afghanistan, Pakistan and India in South Asia for the winters.


The angut's migration map. Osmaniye is in the yellow area
between the two green parts that touch Turkey.

This year, though, only the female angut returned and despite it now
being time to migrate, the bird has remained in its nest on Tuncer's
farm.  Tuncer explained that "this year the male didn't come, only
the female came.  She comes near me and seems to be trying to
explain something. Normally, when the male was here she wouldn't
come near me but this year she does.  It's as if she's grieving.  By now
she should have migrated but she didn't.  Hunters probably killed her
mate."

Veterinarian Bünyamin Akın, the head of the Association for the
Protection and Research of Nature and Wild Animals, underscored
that of the special characteristics of anguts is their loyalty to their
mates.