I liked the idea of this first composition best of these three, but the Merganser’s beak gets lost where it overlaps with the reed behind him.
The second image has a nice profile of his beak and the water has a lighter tint.
Not surprisingly he turned away from me as he passed the end of the reed clump.
He is really something special, it can not go wrong with such colors.
They are quite striking, Hans, and you are right about that color scheme.