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Next time we play this game I want picture(s).
1. bill
2.feet
3. breast
and 4...THE WINGS!

I think if I had a wing to look at that I could tell you exactly what you got there.

That duck is a clusterpopotomus.

Definitely odd........the breast appears to have a red hue as well. Looks like a Mallard/Black cross, and a cinnamon teal slipped in and got involved in a three-way

Not 100% sure but I think what you have there is an immature drake surf scoter. Where was it taken?
How I came up with this is process of elimination:
It's not a wood duck, etc.
It not a lot of things.
The only thing in my book that resembles what you posted is a surf scoter and I'm still not sure. In fact I sort of doubt it
That is all.

There was a surf scoter taken at SangChris Lake over by Rochester, Illinois one year.
If I'm right that was one lost bird. They're supposed to live in the ocean.

I live on the northwest side of Champaign, Illinois.
Long ways north of u.

jsc85 wrote:...however the bill doesnt resemble a scoter

That was my thought. Have only seen one very lost scoter in the flesh (taken from a SW Lousiana rice pond, no less), and it's bill said "sea duck" even before we looked it up. I'd think that your bird is likely crossed with a domestic duck of some sort, but that's just WAGing.

You sure its not just a mallard/domestic hybrid. The body color seems similar to a lot that I have seen. Although they typically have a little white on them somewhere.

SpinnerMan wrote:You sure its not just a mallard/domestic hybrid. The body color seems similar to a lot that I have seen. Although they typically have a little white on them somewhere.

At this point it could be a lot of things. The gw's can tell all birds from just a wing. (that info is missing)

If the bill is blue then that's a clue.
Them feet match the feet off a surf scoter but lots of ducks feet look very similar.
I'm using the LeMaster Method which has totally failed so far.
Just guessing at this point. A wing unfolded would help.

The mallard domestic cross birds I've shot in my career were very large compared to a normal duck. Once I shot one that was obviously an escaped something or other x mallard. That was at Oakwood Bottoms. GW couldn't tell me what I had so we agreed it was a duck and that was that.

Depends which domestics they are crossed with.

The one place I hunted as a kid had a feral white domestic duck that flew around with a flock of park ducks. We saw them most times we went hunting, but never got a crack at them. Same size or a little smaller than all the mallards.

Last time I was in downtown Naperville, there were several park duck/domestic duck hybrids that are the exact same size as the other pure mallard park ducks. They are also pretty similar in color, but they all had some white on them and not as much of the other colors as this one, but similar.

There are a million variations of just domesticated mallards and then cross them with wild mallards and you get all kinds of things.

http://www.gobirding.eu/Photos/DomesticDucks.php

My other reason beyond the picture is his first gut reaction.

jsc85 wrote:Black duck cross? Melinated mallard?

I assume he has shot enough mallards that any large differences beyond color would have jumped out.

However, I agree. Always spread out the wing enough so it shows clear enough in the picture. I try to do that in my pictures even when I am not trying to identify ducks just so others can immediately know what is in the picture when they are not mallards.