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musk duck
The musk duck (''Biziura lobata'') is a highly aquatic, stiff-tailed duck native to southern Australia. It is the only living member of the genus ''Biziura''. An extinct relative, the New Zealand musk duck or de Lautour's duck (''B. delautouri''), once occurred on New Zealand, but is only known from prehistoric subfossil bones. It was about 8% longer than the living species, with a particularly large head.〔
This animal derives its common name from the peculiar musky odour it emanates during the breeding season. Musk ducks are moderately common through the Murray-Darling and Cooper Creek basins, and in the wetter, fertile areas in the south of the continent: the southwest corner of Western Australia, Victoria, and Tasmania.
==Description==
Adult males are long and have a distinctive large, leathery lobe underneath the bill; females are long and unadorned. Their drab dark grey-brown, sightly pin-striped plumage is inconspicuous and does not differ between the sexes. This species weighs an average of in males and in females, with the smallest females weighing only and the largest males weighing up to . On average they are the second heaviest diving duck in the world after the common eider, with male musk ducks actually being slightly heavier than male common eiders but female eiders being rather larger than female musk ducks due to that species' lesser size sexual dimorphism.〔''CRC Handbook of Avian Body Masses, 2nd Edition'' by John B. Dunning Jr. (Editor). CRC Press (2008), ISBN 978-1-4200-6444-5.〕 Musk ducks float very low in the water, almost like a cormorant, and the large webbed feet are well back on the body. The ducklings are covered in dark brown down.
In its native range, the fanned tail is distinctive, allowing to distinguish this species from the freckled duck (''Stictonetta naevosa'') which has similar size, colouration and habits. The blue-billed duck (''Oxyura australis'') has a similarly shaped tail but the main colour of its males in breeding plumage is a much richer chestnut brown. Females and males in nonbreeding plumage are very similar however and if one is not intimately familiar with the slight differences in behaviour, they cannot be told apart from female musk ducks at a distance. Male musk ducks in the breeding season are usually unmistakable due to the large bill lobe.
抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』
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