The North American Checklist Committee of the AOU has published the 52nd supplement to the AOU Checklist of North American Birds. This supplement includes a lot of changes “under the hood” which will hardly be noticed by the average birder. Several splits result in new names but none have an immediate impact on the North American […]
New bird names in the 52nd AOU Checklist supplement Read More »
Usually. Experienced observers can almost always identify these species correctly based on careful judgment of head shape and bill size, but these are subtle and subjective impressions, and require a foundation of experience and/or direct comparisons with Sooty. Other features can offer supportive clues or draw attention to a potential Short-tailed, but are not very
Can Short-tailed Shearwater be identified in the field? Read More »
The Eurasian subspecies group of Common Merganser, known by the English name Goosander, has occurred numerous times in the Aleutian Islands of western Alaska, but has never been identified farther east in North America. The American subspecies has some potential to wander to Eurasia, but has never been recorded there. I’ve never seen any in-depth
Distinguishing Eurasian and American Common Merganser Read More »
The photo above was recently sent to me by reader Wil Domke. It shows an adult Trumpeter Swan (based on bill size and shape, and on Wil’s identification in the field) with a small yellowish patch on the loral skin. This yellow marking is similar to the yellow spot shown by most Tundra Swans. According
Trumpeter Swans with yellow loral spots Read More »
Dark morph (Cory’s) Least Bittern Note: I have never personally seen a living Cory’s Least Bittern. In fact, only six or so have been seen during my lifetime. Most of what follows is based on a very thorough 1996 research paper by Ron Pittaway and Peter Burke (see References below). The illustration shown below is
The mysterious dark Least Bittern Read More »
I have donated the painting shown at right – an Osprey carrying a small Striped Bass – to The Nature Conservancy’s Mashomack Preserve on Shelter Island, New York. It will be auctioned at their annual Dinner Dance fundraiser on July 30th. If you’re in the area you might want to drop in and check it
Osprey painting at auction Read More »
Last winter’s Common Moorhen in Newfoundland, given the likely split of New World and Old World moorhens into separate species, led me to try to determine the origin of the Newfoundland bird. That study of photos turned up a few small differences in bill color and shape, but nothing fully reliable. Now I have finally
The Newfoundland Moorhen was an American based on back color Read More »
In these two very similar species, the head plumes of adults provide the single most obvious and reliable distinction. The brief descriptions in field guides fail to convey the fundamental differences in these feathers, so a detailed description is given here to clarify those differences.
Differences in plumes of Little and Snowy Egret Read More »
When considering impressions of shape and size as in Optical illusions and bird identification or More on illusions of size, one important aspect that I’ve mentioned only in passing is relative size. Consider the two birds in the sketches below, which one has the longer bill? I suspect that viewers will say either “They’re about the
Relative size and proportions Read More »
This is a follow-up to my recent post about Optical illusions and bird identification. While working on some heron studies the other day, I found a good example of an illusory bill size comparison. Compare the bill in the two images of Reddish Egret shown below. To my eye, at least, the bird on the
More on illusions of size Read More »