Rare duck spotted in Sutherland

The most colourful and rarest of ducks to visit Britain has turned up in Sutherland.

The Harlequin Duck has only been recorded in the UK a few dozen times previously, according to records stretching back to 1954.

The bird was spotted at the mouth of Loch Fleet at Littleferry near Golspie on Sunday.

The drake is the most colourful sex of the species.

They are usually found in America but there is an outpost colony of 3000-5000 pairs in Iceland and this bird may have come from there.

Adult males are slate blue with chestnut sides and white markings including a white crescent at the base of the bill.

Adult females are less colourful, with brownish-grey plumage and a white patch on the head around the eye. Both adults have a white ear-patch.

Their breeding habitat is cold fast moving streams in north-western and north-eastern North America, Greenland, Iceland and western Russia.

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