Jul 30, 2026 · 33 min · 8 segments
Steamer ducks are big, mostly flightless, famously aggressive ducks in South America. An amazing example of evolution in action, because some supposedly flying steamer ducks can't fly, and some…
And there he observed an animal that he subsequently wrote this about: "In these islands, a great loggerheaded duck or goose is very abundant.
These birds were in former days called, from their extraordinary manner of paddling and splashing upon the water, racehorses, but now they are named much more appropriately steamers.
Their wings are too small and weak to allow of flight, but by their aid, partly swimming and partly flapping the surface of the water, they move very quickly." There's plenty more we can say about these big flightless ducks, steamer ducks, than Darwin could, not just because we know a lot more about the interesting stuff going on in their lives and behavior, but because we know or think we know much, much more about their evolution than Darwin ever could have.
The one Charles Darwin was talking about in the passage earlier was the Falkland steamer duck, found only in that one small archipelago.
There are on the South American mainland two more species, the Chubut or white-headed steamer duck on the east coast of Argentina, and the Magellanic or Fuegian steamer duck in Tierra del Fuego and some way up the west coast of Chile.
All three of these species, Falkland, white-headed, Magellanic, are big, flightless marine ducks.
Then there is number four, the odd one out, the flying steamer duck, found all across the southern bit of South America, inland on freshwater as well as along the coastline, and all the way out to the Falkland Islands.
That is the version of this you'll find in most places anyone talks about steamer ducks anyway.
Three flightless, relatively localized species, one more widespread flying species.
I'll tell you now, the actual situation is not as clear-cut and not as definite as that There's been a very recent claim that what we call the Magellanic steamer duck is actually two different species, but so far as I know that's unsupported by any genetic evidence so far, so I'm going to ignore it.
The situation's plenty complicated enough without that, because there are some really basic questions here about who can fly, who can't, how you tell species apart, and so on.
And the underlying wonder in all of this is that it looks as though with steamer ducks we're witnessing evolution in action, effectively in real time.
The name steamer duck comes from the way these ducks thrash their wings in a somewhat rotary motion through the water surface when they want to move faster than their feet can paddle.
It was thought to be reminiscent of the old-style steam-driven paddle steamers that had big water wheels on either side constantly turning to move them forwards.
In fact, the Magellanic steamer duck, the biggest of them, is supposed to be the heaviest bird called a duck in the world, at the top end of the weight range for female wild turkeys for comparison.
Even the flightless species can have wingspans of up to around a metre, over three feet.
So the wings are very, very much present, just not up to the task of keeping these heavy birds aloft.
Fine for some furious paddling to zoom the bird over the surface of the water, but not for taking to the air.
And there he observed an animal that he subsequently wrote this about: "In these islands, a great loggerheaded duck or goose is very abundant.
These birds were in former days called, from their extraordinary manner of paddling and splashing upon the water, racehorses, but now they are named much more appropriately steamers.
Their wings are too small and weak to allow of flight, but by their aid, partly swimming and partly flapping the surface of the water, they move very quickly." There's plenty more we can say about these big flightless ducks, steamer ducks, than Darwin could, not just because we know a lot more about the interesting stuff going on in their lives and behavior, but because we know or think we know much, much more about their evolution than Darwin ever could have.
The one Charles Darwin was talking about in the passage earlier was the Falkland steamer duck, found only in that one small archipelago.
There are on the South American mainland two more species, the Chubut or white-headed steamer duck on the east coast of Argentina, and the Magellanic or Fuegian steamer duck in Tierra del Fuego and some way up the west coast of Chile.
All three of these species, Falkland, white-headed, Magellanic, are big, flightless marine ducks.
Then there is number four, the odd one out, the flying steamer duck, found all across the southern bit of South America, inland on freshwater as well as along the coastline, and all the way out to the Falkland Islands.
That is the version of this you'll find in most places anyone talks about steamer ducks anyway.
Three flightless, relatively localized species, one more widespread flying species.
I'll tell you now, the actual situation is not as clear-cut and not as definite as that There's been a very recent claim that what we call the Magellanic steamer duck is actually two different species, but so far as I know that's unsupported by any genetic evidence so far, so I'm going to ignore it.
The situation's plenty complicated enough without that, because there are some really basic questions here about who can fly, who can't, how you tell species apart, and so on.
And the underlying wonder in all of this is that it looks as though with steamer ducks we're witnessing evolution in action, effectively in real time.
The name steamer duck comes from the way these ducks thrash their wings in a somewhat rotary motion through the water surface when they want to move faster than their feet can paddle.
It was thought to be reminiscent of the old-style steam-driven paddle steamers that had big water wheels on either side constantly turning to move them forwards.
In fact, the Magellanic steamer duck, the biggest of them, is supposed to be the heaviest bird called a duck in the world, at the top end of the weight range for female wild turkeys for comparison.
Even the flightless species can have wingspans of up to around a metre, over three feet.
So the wings are very, very much present, just not up to the task of keeping these heavy birds aloft.
Fine for some furious paddling to zoom the bird over the surface of the water, but not for taking to the air.
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