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“I think it’s a surf scoter,” she told Kveven.

Steve Heinl, a biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, said the Bonaparte’s gull and surf scoter love to fly up through the Tongass Narrows by the thousands, but many other species pick different paths.

Mr. Prosek’s vigilance about the limitations of nomenclature led him to invent hybrid species derived from actual names, like the part-bird, part-fish “Parrotfishe,” and “Flying Fox With Lady’s Slippers,” a serene, taxidermied red fox complete with wings from a surf scoter.

In habits and food the Surf Scoter resembles the common species, deriving its name from the pertinacity with which it selects, as its feeding-ground, a sandy beach over which surf rolls.