Water off a duck's back

Visited the Doctor's Pond in Dunmow and captured a crested duck busy diving under the water and then surfacing in attempt to clean the feathers. I managed to photograph the partner a few weeks ago.

The crested duck is descended from the domestic mallard and the crest is actually caused by a genetic mutation.

The crest is usually the result of crossing a bird with a crested gene and one without. Only about 30% of the resulting offspring will sprout crests. Sad news is that if two crested ducks breed, the offspring will usually die shortly after birth.