Mike in the Wild

I see lots of what I call water birds in Arizona.  Also called waterfowl, these creatures spend most of their lives on or near bodies of water, where they depend on a lake or river for their primary habitat.  But there are many other general names for the ever-present mallards and the winter-visiting ring-necked ducks, to name just a couple of the species that are easy to spot in Phoenix. Ducks are frequently described as either dabbling or diving, with the fowl in the first category (e.g. mallards) feeding closer to the water's surface and the second (e.g. ring-necked ducks) hunting deeper below.  And depending on your source of information, dabbling ducks are very often referred to as marsh ducks, and divers as bay ducks.  Now you may be starting to understand why I just call them all water birds. But I became even more enlightened when on a recent trip to San Diego I discovered yet another group of these birds: sea ducks.  These animals are indeed duc...