Mergus

Common card · No. 466919

Mergus is the genus containing the typical mergansers ( mur-GAN-sərz), fish-eating ducks in the subfamily Anatinae. The common merganser or goosander (Mergus merganser) and red-breasted merganser (M. serrator) have broad ranges in the northern hemisphere. The Brazilian merganser (M. octosetaceus) is a South American duck, and one of the six most threatened waterfowl in the world, with possibly fewer than 250 birds in the wild. The scaly-sided merganser or "Chinese merganser" (M. squamatus) is also an endangered species; it lives in temperate eastern Asia, breeding in the northeast and wintering further south. The hooded merganser (Lophodytes cucullatus, formerly known as Mergus cucullatus) is not currently included in this genus but is closely related, and may be embedded within it. The other "aberrant" merganser, the smew (Mergellus albellus), previously thought to be closer to goldeneyes (Bucephala) due to the occurrence of natural hybrids, is now known to be basal to all the other mergansers...

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