Hi Everybody,

I agree with Frode and Danny. The bird is an Orchard Oriole. As further support for this I submit that Peter Mann and I birded Turkey Pt. on Labor Day morning (4 Sept) and had 9 Orchard Orioles (OROR) and 11 Baltimore Orioles (BAOR)for our outing. 

The bird in the photos, although not a sharp image, shows a slender, long-tailed jizz; solid yellowish underparts (BAORs usually have some gray on the belly); narrow white wingbars of equal width (BAORs have the median covert bar broader and whiter); athinner bill than a BAOR; lacks strong orange tones in the head and breast (as Danny noted, a washed-out photo might lose this); and lacks obvious dark streaks on the upper back or mantle (however, the streaks are often smudgy in young female BAOR). These features point to Orchard Oriole as the more likely identification. Orchard Orioles are so much less robust than Baltimores they often give the impression of being a large, slender warbler. Thank you for sharing the photos. We're all still learning to how to identify birds under all of the difficult circumstances Nature throws at us to confuse the matter.

Good birding,

Walter Ellison

23460 Clarissa Rd
Chestertown, MD 21620

phone: 410-778-9568

e-mail: rossgull(AT)baybroadband.net

"Nothing is as easy as you would like it to be, and nothing is as hard
as you might fear"


Danny Bystrak wrote:

I have to agree with Frode -- looks more like an Orchard, but the pic is so bright, it could be a washed out Balt.  Labor day weekend is the very tail end of Orchard time here (my latest date is Sept 7, and most year I don't see them in Sept at all.
 
danny bystrak
bristol, aa co. md

-- Monroe Harden <> wrote:

> >
> > Monroe here with another bird identification question.  I saw
> > the yellow
> > bird in these grainy photos:
> >
> > http://monroe.20m.com/yellowbird.htm
> >
> > on the trail heading toward the Turkey Point hawk watch site
> > in Cecil County
> > over Labor Day weekend.
> >
>