Sergey Dereliev

Medium-sized duck with extremely large breeding range across wetlands in whole North of Europe and Asia from Iceland to Bering Sea. Some decline but population still very large. Birds from large part of breeding range wintering along coasts of Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, France, Britain and Ireland and Italian Po Delta. Hunted in most of range, resulting in many recoveries. During winter inhabits large variety of open, wet areas. Herbivorous, with grasses dominating the diet. Forages nocturnally and rests during the day, but activity pattern influenced by degree of hunting.

Season of assessment

B

Population trendDecreasing
Population size
(min-max, best estimate)		451000-733000,574000
Red List categoryLC
Franks, S., Fiedler, W., Arizaga, J., Jiguet, F., Nikolov, B., van der Jeugd, Ambrosini, R, Aizpurua, O., Bairlein, F., Clark, J., Fattorini, N, Hammond, M., Higgins, D, Levering, H., Skellorn, W., Spina, F, Thorup, K. Walker, J., Woodward, I. and Baillie, S.R. (1) (2022) Online Atlas of the movements of European bird populations. https://migrationatlas.org EURING/CMS (1) Principal investigator
Map

Overall Connectivity for Eurasian Wigeon

Predominant movement patterns along northeast-southwest axis falling within the East Atlantic, Black Sea/Mediterranean and West Asian – East African Flyways. Main wintering sites in western Europe connected to locations in large area of Russia, both West and East of Ural, with some locations very far east. Birds wintering Wolga Delta connected to wintering sites in Mediterranean and breeding sites in Russia. Clear movements among wintering / stop-over sites in Western Europe i.e. between Netherlands and France, Italy and UK. Connections between wintering sites on British Isles and France appear more limited. Recovery patterns may be biased by hunting; Scandinavian origin of part of West-European winterers underestimated and Russian origin overestimated.

Recoveries by Condition for Eurasian Wigeon

Most encounters are in winter, with distinct second peak in May during hunting season in Russia. Two thirds of recoveries related to hunting with no clear trend in time. Ringing recoveries make up most of the other encounters, representing a long tradition of catching and ringing ducks on reserves and in duck decoys.

Annual Movements for Eurasian Wigeon

Wintering birds reach furthest south in mid-winter, with Spanish sites already vacated begin March, France end March. Eastward movements from end March to areas SE of Moscow, then gradually further north to reach breeding belt around Arctic circle end of May. Summering and moulting birds in western Europe show no connection to Russian breeding sites, suggesting no or local breeding, first influx occurs in August after annual wing moult. More birds arrive through September and October, with onwards movements along the western European coasts. Despite presence of the species in winter in sub-Saharan Africa, no encounters there and encounters on north African coast very few and connected to Wolga delta, suggesting eastern origin of wigeon wintering in Africa.

Connectivity by Month by Region for Eurasian Wigeon

Traditional duck decoys in Netherlands are focal points with strong connections to France and Eastern UK in mid-winter. Wetland reserves are nuclei in UK, with most winter connections to other sites on British Isles, and to Italy and France. Wintering birds in Western Europe connected to sites in Finland in summer, connections further east to Russia are mainly in May, when most hunting takes place, with April encounters occurring further south, representing earlier arrival and spring hunting. South-Eastern and South-central European wintering areas connect to both wintering areas in western Europe and in the Wolga Delta, linking birds from different flyways. Wolga winterers mainly connect to Russia east of Ural in May. Some birds in Iceland in summer connect to East coast of US in autumn.

Henk van der Jeugd

References

Statistics Map
N records N individuals N recoveries
Mapped data*
Total available data
*Mapped data include only distant (>= 50 km) recoveries