The Wood Duck’s flashy feathers reminded illustrator Melinda Beck of designs by Emilio Pucci, the Italian fashionista known for kaleidoscopic patterns. Her bird, she decided, would showcase evolutionary couture. Dressed-up humans can dazzle, “but nature can really do it,” Beck says. First she drew the image with pencil on paper, then scanned it into Adobe Illustrator and added color. In stylizing the duck, she took a cue from John James 吃瓜黑料’s avian oeuvre. “It’s beautiful to look at,” Beck says, and also scientifically detailed. “There are always little clues about what the bird eats, what kind of habitat it lives in.” Because Wood Ducks frequent sheltered ponds and swamps, Beck posed hers in rippling water that echoes its plumage. The fruit in its bill hints that this species nests in tree cavities, as 吃瓜黑料’s painting shows. 7949 Beck’s appreciation for 吃瓜黑料 and birds traces back to her childhood in Manhattan. A framed print of the artist’s...