Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 08:20:07 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Scott Crabtree Subject: Re: Horsehead trip - 10/26/03 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Bob, et al; Kevin asked me to provide the details, and I wrote up my notes in the parking lot after I broke off from the group at about 11:00. Our small group was heading out the "Pine Trail" that proceeds easterly from the blind at the pond in the main complex. It's an area of mature pines with little undergrowth, and is known for holding hermit thrushes. At about 9:30, we were checking out a winter wren in one tangle of vines, when we noticed some thrushes - turned out to be a total of four Catharids, but I'll only comment on two. Actually, the first bird, which we're calling Bicknell's, attracted my immediate attention as is was darker, more compact, and that it had a shorter bill, tail and primary extension than I'm used to seeing. Now, we get in to the difficult area of describing colors. I will say that the cap, back, rump, and wing coverts were a brownish-gray, by which I mean that the color was gray with a hint of brown (or chestnut in this case) warmth. The auriculars were a more neutral gray, with the solidity of the color more diffused at the edges, creating no well-defined boundary with the malar region. The primary edges and tail had an additional warmer chestnut hue, but without marked contrast that would make you take notice at first glance. There was a very thin eye-line, broken at the top. The proximal (I mean closer to the face) half of the lower mandible was very yellow, contrasting with the dark tip enough to make the short bill look "blob-ended." Ground color of the breast was a very light buff or cream, and was closely spotted, which only extended through the upper breast. I would not call the spotting heavy, or the spots large. The malar stripe (or sub-moustachial stripe, or lateral throat stripe - take your pick) set off an unmarked throat of very light buff, lighter than the breast, approaching white. Finally, the flanks were of the same warm gray color to match the upperparts. At no time did the bird ever pump its tail, except for a single pump when alighting. Nor did it ever vocalize. I did hear one "chup" from the hermit, below. I eventually had this bird in the same field of view with a hermit thrush, and it was definitely smaller, darker, and not nearly as warm-colored as the hermit, and its primary edges and tail never approached the rufous of the hermit. The bird was actually quite cooperative - we observed its front half for a good two minutes at binocular distance while it sat with its rear half obscured by vines. The bird moved off down the path, and was relocated in the open where we had great views for about three minutes. It sat still enough that we could view it in Paul Noell's Questar Birder, Elise Kreiss's Swarovski HD 65, and my Nikon ED 82. We were able to do "round-robin" turns looking in each others' scopes to check the various angles. I do recognize that this observation was about 10 days past the late-date in the Yellow Book for Bicknell's, but I reason that Bicknell's was split from gray-cheeked only a few years before the Yellow Book was published, and that there may not have been a whole lot of temporal distribution data collected on gray-cheeked subspecies prior to the split. I believe that I've separated this bird from hermit, above, and that the extensive yellow in the bill and warm tones to the tail and primary extension lead me away from gray-cheeked. Its colors were far to "cold" for it to have been either veery or Swainson's. Hope that helps. Scott Crabtree Chester, MD crabtree@myshorelink.com ----- Original Message ----- From: Robert Ringler To: Sent: Monday, October 27, 2003 6:41 AM Subject: Re: [MDOSPREY] Horsehead trip - 10/26/03 > Kevin, > Please tell us about the Bicknell's Thrush. I'm sure everyone > would be > interested to know how it was identified. > > Bob Ringler > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: Kevin Graff > To: > Sent: Monday, October 27, 2003 12:12 AM > Subject: [MDOSPREY] Horsehead trip - 10/26/03 > > > > Hi all, > > > > Chesapeake Bay Environmental Center "formally > > Horsehead Wetlands Center", Grasonville, Queen Anne's County, MD - > > 10/26/03 > > > > Observers: Kevin Graff, Scott Crabtree, Elise Kreiss, > > & > > Paul Noell > > > > Weather: MC to PS, cool, windy, 60 degree? warm later > > 1 Red-breasted Nuthatch > > 2 Brown Creeper > > 2 Winter Wren > > 1 SEDGE WREN - good closeup view > > 11 Golden-crowned Kinglet > > 4 Ruby-crowned Kinglet > > 2 Hermit Thrush > > 1 BICKNELL'S THRUSH > > ====================================================================== > = > To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com > with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey > ======================================================================= > > ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================