Duck's Demise ....

See it larger for FULL FEATHERED DETAIL

It's been a funny old day - in the words of the wonderful Arkwright in Open All Hours.
We've had a combination of a brisk wind, dark clouds and clear spells. When the sun's hidden it's blooming cold, when the sun's out it's lovely and warm - and it changes every 10 minutes or so. Added to this there have been a few sudden spells of biting hail, so dunging my paddock today consisted of running for cover 3 times, having only a few minutes earlier been bathing in warm sunshine. Oh, and did I mention the rain showers too? Yep, it's been a funny old day .....
I took my camera with me when dunging, as usual, hoping to find something blip-worthy. I did find a large patch of small, fluffy white feathers with raindrops on them which I took a few shots of. Then, some distance away from where I was working, I noticed something intriguing. On investigating I found the remains of a duck - just one single wing, intact, and still bearing raindrops. The patch of smaller feathers I'd seen some distance away came from the same bird I reckon. Something had obviously had a good meal in the early hours; one of the local foxes I suspect, as my Middy-cat goes for much smaller things and far prefers rodents and small rabbits to our feathered friends - he never bothers with the birds in my garden, which I'm really glad about.

So, the demise of that duck gave me the opportunity to do something I'd never normally be able to do - study close up, and take macro shots of , the lovely colours and patterns in the plumage of these pretty birds. I brought the wing indoors with me, hoping that when the remaining fleshy parts at the base have deteriorated the skeletal part and feathers will remain intact - it's far too lovely to just discard, and I hope to find a suitable display case to put it in and mount it on the wall.
I'm inclined to think it's from a female Mallard, but am not totally convinced - if anyone can enlighten me here's a view of THE ENTIRE WING.