What bird is this? Looks like a loon. Has a yellowish slightly upcurved beek (long and thin), and rust red...?

...rest red circular color below base of beak, and a small patch of rust red above the beak. Long neck. The overall color is dark black/brown. Dives for long periods and swims far. It looks to be about 1 1/2 times as large as a Mallard. Spotted on 2/19/07 in Lynnwood, Wa. Is this a 'common loon'? I can't find any examples of a common loon with this rust-red colored cheek and the upturned beak (I'm taking an environmental science class and had to go birding today, but this one is driving me nuts...)|||A few I can think of suggesting that live in your area are..


Clarks Grebe.. http://www.utahbirds.org/birdsofutah/Bir鈥?/a>


Western Grebe.. http://sdakotabirds.com/diffids/western_鈥?/a>


Red-necked grebe.. http://images.google.ca/images?svnum=10%26amp;鈥?/a>


Yellow-billed loon.. http://images.google.ca/images?svnum=10%26amp;鈥?/a>


Pelagic Cormorant.. http://alaska.fws.gov/fisheries/fieldoff鈥?/a>


Brandt's cormorant.. http://www.bobsteelephoto.com/Species/br鈥?/a>


Double-crested Cormorant.. http://www.florida-tourism.net/florida-w鈥?/a>





Other than that I cant think of anything else.. you might try going to this site with a list of birds in your area and do a image search for each aquatic bird to see if it was the one you saw.. http://www.ups.edu/x5665.xml


Good luck! I hope you identify your bird!





PS I doubt it is a common loon.. they do not have any red except for their eyes and their bills are black.. http://everyschool.org/u/shelly/egmeyer/鈥?/a>|||Glad I could be of help!!

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|||A long neck, upturned beak and red patches sounds like an avocet but it is nothing like a loon.|||What about one of the Cormorants? Pelagic Cormorant, which I have seen on the coast of Washington does have some red on the face.|||It could be, but it sounds more like a yellow-billed loon, the common loon has a black straight beak, while the yellow-billed loon has a yellow, slightly upturned beak just like you described. Other than the beak they both seem pretty similar to me. Take a look at both their pages on wikipedia and see what you think:


Common: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_North鈥?/a>


Yellow billed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-bille鈥?/a>





As for the rust red, I'm stumped. Maybe it was dirty?





P.S. While I do know a lot about birds, I am from Australia and have never even seen a loon in real life, so make sure you double-check all this, definitely check out the wikipedia pages.