An eider duck (Somateria mollissima) on the ice at Llanelli Wildfowl & Wetlands Centre, Christmas 2009
Eider ducks are different. For some reason I have always thought of them as rather “Art Deco” in design. I hope the pictured Clarice Cliff plate gives you some idea where I am coming from on that one!
A Clarice Cliff plate
For a couple of years I have been a visitor to the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust centre at Llanelli but until a few weeks ago I had never been able to take a decent picture of an eider duck. During the summer they keep themselves to themselves on the far side of the pond or the nesting island in the middle of it.
At Christmas 2009 I went along hoping to get a decent shot – maybe for next year’s Christmas card – but at first I thought I would fail again. The pond was frozen over and the ducks were on their island.
But as soon as we appeared and they could see we had a bag of corn, the ducks all came running across the ice, the male eiders leading the charge, their big feet slapping on the thick ice, while smaller ducks went cartwheeling around on the slippery surface. It was the first time we had seen them so close. I love ’em.
An eider duck pictured with a pair of common mallards, to give an idea of size...
The Common Eider, Somateria mollissima, is the UK’s heaviest sea-duck and is usually found on the northern coasts of Europe, North America and eastern Siberia. In the wild it breeds in the Arctic and some other northern temperate regions, but winters farther south. It seems to be a permanent resident at WWT Llanelli in South Wales, although without protection it would probably tend to stay further north.
Apparently eiders love to eat shellfish, which has got them into a bit of trouble with mussel farmers.
I grew up with eiderdowns in the 1960s before I had ever heard of eider ducks. The word fitted into the lovely cosy vocabulary of the bedroom, along with bedstead, mattress, sheet, blanket, bedspread, quilt, pillow and bolster. Eiderdowns were always a rich old-fashioned rose pink or Victorian green, of shiny satin.
We didn’t have valances – they were for rich people – and didn’t know what a duvet was until the 1980s. Beds were high lumpy things on a heavy iron base with squeaky springs stretched across.
Quilted eiderdowns were introduced into Britain in Victorian times and were often stuffed with goose down rather than eider duck down. The stitched panels of the quilt stopped the down moving around and bunching.
Although I grew up snug under an eiderdown at night, my thrifty Yorkshire mother-in-law used an eiderdown purely for decoration on the bed during the day. You had to take it off and fold it at night so it didn’t get dirty…
According to Wikipedia the eider’s nest is built close to the sea and is lined with the eiderdown, plucked from the female’s breast. This soft and warm lining has long been harvested for filling pillows and quilts, but now it has been largely replaced by down from domestic farm geese and synthetic alternatives.
Although true eiderdown pillows or quilts (known in America as “comforters”) are now a rarity, eiderdown harvesting continues and is sustainable, as it can be done after the ducklings leave the nest with no harm to the birds.
Well, that’s a relief!
Pictured below is an absolute dream of an eiderdown featured on a wonderful blog spot I have just discovered: http://vintage-home.blogspot.com – go visit!
The most wonderful eiderdown from Clare's Vintage Home blog spot - click on the picture to visit...
