Kurt and Darius, I did some research at home last night (without your description, which I left in the office). Thanks for your (additional) messages. I brought the Pyle banding guide and the Howell and Webb Mexican guide in to work and *if* I have time today will study them with Kurt's original post at hand. Otherwise I will do that tonight. Kurt-- I am thinking about visiting Riverbend Park tomorrow, Saturday. If you receive this message before 4 (possibly 6) pm, can you reply privately? Thanks, Rob Hilton robert@csa.com Bethesda, Md. At 07:28 PM 10/8/98 EDT, KurtCapt87@aol.com wrote: >Rob, > >I have heard of this thin wing bar on the black wings of Scarlet's >occasionally being seen on first year birds after the molt into basic plummage >(or maybe it is during the molt?). Cannot say I have ever seen this, but all >the books describe it to some degree. Fortunately, the wing bars on a Western >are quite obvious (including the one at Riverbend) and do not require a second >look from a more direct angle to glimpse. In fact, when I first viewed the >bird, it was from the back and the lime green scapular, lighter lime green >colored-nape and back of head and the white wing bars on the grayish wings >(viewing angle about 15degrees, and note that the wings were not black) lead >to an initial thought that this was a warbler, possibly a Black-throated >Green. When the bird turned and the nice yellow breast (quite unlike a >Scarlet's greenish yellow) contrasted quite well with the nape and scapulars, >I was clearly forced to think in other directions. Imagine, if you will, >picking up a lime and a lemon at the grocery store and holding them side-to- >side. This is somewhat similar to the colors on the Western at Riverbend. > >(There is this great Simon Perkins story in Mass. about denying a Western >sighting because the lime green back was not described. A few minutes after >the initial call was placed to the hotline number, Perkins called the >correspondent with the reply, "you saw a Baltimore Oriole - Westerns have >green backs," and then quickly hung up. No amount of arguments subsequently >made a difference to him since people can easily change their descriptions >after the fact!). > >The helpful Yellow-rump landing on the next branch gave a useful size >reference as well as body shape reference - somewhat chunky and not slender >(which was neccessary to consider and eliminate a Balto Oriole - the poor >lighting at that point had not allowed me to carefully consider the bill of >the bird. Fortunately, I could reacquire the bird after it flew over to the >tree-edge and presented itself in much better light. > >Kurt Gaskill > >