Who am I

 It's not often that you randomly come across something you've never seen before, but a couple days ago saw a huge passerine movement through Michigan.  Unfortunately I couldn't be out much that morning, but it was still active in the afternoon in Riverview.  One of the birds I saw was a very dark warbler.

It's missing most of the tail.  In the field it clearly had a yellow rump, which is suggested in the top pic.  I think it's a Yellow-rumped Warbler mostly still in juvenile plumage.  It felt really early for Yellow-rumps but Riverview is a good place for them.  Palm also has a yellow rump, but I doubt would have such strong wingbars?  The next pic is a clear Yellow-rump, though these birds were outnumbered by Palms by 10 or 20 to one.

There was also a Bay-breast on the ground.  This one did have a smidge of bay along the flanks, though it was a lot more visible when the bird moved up to the trees.

Because the warblers were on the ground, the thrushes would be in the trees right?

There've been loads of Swainson's, and if there's tons of Swainson's then there'll be a few Gray-cheeks as well.  Above is probably my best ever Gray-cheeked pic.

Transitioning to bad pics, here's my first Yellow-bellied Flycatcher of the year.  My settings were all wrong and I badly over-exposed a bird that's very intensely colored.

The next pic is my first Philadelphia Vireo of the year, on this one the settings actually weren't bad, but strong backlighting through green leaves really made the color wonky.  The brightest yellow was right where the throat met the breast, but that was hard to document. 

Finally two decent pics, first a Marsh Wren that surprised me.  You don't hear them sing in the fall.

The Wood-pewees are still singing though.

Drama on the home front

All spring I've been occasionally thinking that I've been hearing a Yellow-throated Warbler, not a very common yard bird in Michigan, though not inconceivable given some large sycamores in the river bottom and large white pines in the neighborhood. However, every time I would think I'd hear it, a migrant Tennessee or Nashville Warbler or a local Indigo Bunting (one of whose songs trends down in pitch through most of the song) would walk all over it. However, the Tennessees and Nashvilles are now far to the north and the buntings are paired up and singing a lot less and not even I could ignore the persistent tew, tew, tew, te-ew, te-eww, tew-wi any longer. I digi-flipped the bird through the scope and this shot is a still from the video.
Later while I was again trying to track down the warbler I saw a bird feeding another in the tulip tree. One was this Chipping Sparrow, and not surprisingly,

the other was this cowbird, the only thing that my yard Chipping Sparrows ever seem to raise.

Later in the evening I found the cowbird on the sidewalk, I guess a casualty of the plate glass windows or something; it also showed the sheathed, still-developing, tail feathers that the Mourning Dove I found at Tiscornia displayed.

Finally while looking up at them in the Tulip Tree originally, I noticed my tree making tulips, something I haven't seen it do before.

Not an Inca Dove

Well duh, of course a Sora isn't an Inca Dove.
This bird was either oblivious of me standing outside the edge of the drowned thicket at Floral, or else secure in the knowledge that I couldn't get in. It was still hard, though, to get clear shots through the vegetation.

Here's the byline bird, a juvie Mourning Dove. A week ago we started seeing this year's crop of Horned Lark (a scaled bird commonly mistaken for Sprague's Pipit). Mourning Doves are usually the first juvenile I see; last year they also appeared in the first couple days of May. This one's been out of the nest for at least that long. Their scaliness could conceivably make a person think of an Inca Dove.

This yellowthroat was the only even semi-cooperative warbler I encountered today (at Tiscornia).

I'm used to seeing either adult males or else the plain fall birds that skulk far less than breeders. This (presumed) adult female bird has more of a subtle mask than the fall birds. Dunn and Garrett state in the Peterson Warbler guide that first spring males are essentially indistinguishable from older males.

Red Admirals have been abundant at Tiscornia of late. American Ladies (below) are also becoming very common.

Fall chippies

I wish I'd tried to save the doppler image from Wunderground yesterday morning as it seemed to show the reflection pattern that I think is migrating birds north of a front and none south of the front. Anyway, Floral was awash with sparrows yesterday, hordes of juncos and white-crowned, but a lot of chipping and whitethroats as well as smaller numbers of less common species (including half a dozen vespers and one clay-colored).

I returned today hoping to get some portraits. There were a lot fewer birds today; thickets that yesterday held 8 orange-crowned warblers today might have one. I didn't see vesper, Lincoln's, or clay-colored. I concentrated on the chipping sparrows. It doesn't take much grass to hide a sparrow.
They were fairly variable, some were still practically in breeding plumage, though I didn't manage any shots in focus of these. I think my camera exaggerated the rufous-ness of the plumage and the crowns in the more typical winter birds.

They're pretty hard to age in the fall per Pyle as most of the first year birds undergo some pre-basic moult into the winter plumage and approach the appearance of adults.

It's too bad I couldn't get a shot at the clay-colored yesterday or find one today. The bird had much brighter underparts than the chippies with a warm buffy breast and whiter throat and malar ground color, very different from the colder tones of the chippie's medium gray.

White crowned's, on the other hand, are twice as big and half as shy as most sparrows and are fairly easy targets for digi-scoping.

A baby and my babies

I have no doubt that coming soon to this space will be crackerjack photos of a least tern in early morning light with the Tiscornia lighthouses in the background. However, until Tim finds one, we'll have to make do with things my 3-year-old finds.

Hazel was playing in her "fort," the cleared out space beneath a blue spruce in the front yard and apparently flushed out "a birdie!" which she ran to tell Mommy about. I set up the scope when I got home so she could see it better.
She'd found a juvenile mourning dove, probably not long out of the nest. I saw my first juvie mourning doves this year very early in May, so this bird must be part of the second crop.

She didn't really need the scope to get close, she could walk within feet of it before it would walk back under the spruce.

RB grosbeak profile

Rose-breasted grosbeaks are obviously a fairly charismatic member of our avifauna; they're frequently the bird brought up by people at work when they find out I'm a birder.

When they first arrive from their migration at the end of April and the end of May they hit the feeders pretty hard re-fueling before they really work on setting up territories. Many of the first spring birds still show their age with prominent brown edges to the mantle and un-moulted brown feathers in the wings.
This adult male still has scant brown edging to the fresh back feathers yet to wear off but has solidly black coverts and flight feathers.

And the classic full adult male...

Despite being really common we somehow nearly missed this species on a summer big day back in Washtenaw and was seen by only one team member (Lathe if I remember right).

Of course in addition to being a striking bird, it's also a solid songster. Here's sonograms made from a bird I video'd while atlasing back in Washtenaw a few years ago. These are 5 songs from the same male.

The first 3 phrases are essentially the same but after that it's slightly more variable, though the middle 3 songs are fairly similar for the first 3 seconds. There's a general pattern that the phrases alternate between a higher pitch and a lower pitch though as the song progresses the phrases seem to center around a more similar pitch. I'm not sure if there's a pattern to the variation in each phrase as to how many times it changes the pitch in each phrase or not.

eye candy

If ever there was bird eye candy it would be a scarlet tanager. I found this bird earlier in the week next to Forest Lawn Landfill in nice morning light. It was so red the camera had trouble focusing on it and it read some of the the red as greeen
This bird isn't in full adult alternate plumage given the paler brown-black secondaries and primaries. I think that would make it a second year male per the Pyle guide. Note also the very thin red tips to the fresh tertials. Pyle says this can occur in the wing coverts of after-second year birds but doesn't comment on them in the tertials as far as I can tell.

Here's the bird less over-exposed, you can see that the back and head is wholly red, not the artifactual green as above.

I had hoped to chase a white-faced ibis in Washtenaw today which, had I been able to leave immediately for yesterday when I was called about it, I probably would have had. Unfortunately I was on my way to work when the bird was discovered and as far as I can tell not re-found today. I'm finding it much harder than I expected to meet my original goal to add a bird a year in Washtenaw from Berrien. I succeeded on a chase for pacific loon, but missed on chases for golden eagle and black-throated gray warbler, and couldn't leave immediately for this bird (which would have been a state bird). I also didn't chase Franklin's gulls or a varied thrush that didn't seem all that pinned down.

I've been working a lot on the Fish Crow write-up, it took me some time to download the stuff I needed to analyze the video, and there's some more stuff I'd like to do but I think I'm starting to wrap it up.

moulting goldfinches

The goldfinches have really started coming into the spring plumage over the last 2 weeks.
This one still has a fair amount of winter coloring to it.

Most of mine look more like this bird, mostly yellow but still with a fair amount of patchy gray. The forehead is the last part of the black cap to come in.

This one is pretty close to full breeding plumage, most of mine aren't quite this far along.

why savannahs shouldn't have roads

Unfortunately, today's road-killed specimen was my fault (yesterday).  Driving home from Hazel's tumbling class ("that was FUN, daddy.  I LIKE fun"), two birds popped up from the roadside, one went straight up, the other inexplicably dipped somewhat and before I could get to the brake it went bounding off the car.  I circled back hoping it would be a house sparrow, but found this little guy instead:

The first thing I noted as I slowed past it, was the somewhat rufous-edged (in the sun) secondaries and my initial thought was "its way to late for a Henslow's." Looking at the entire bird I could see it was a bright little Savannah sparrow.  While savannahs have much shorter tails than something like a song sparrow, the angle of the photo somewhat shortens the tail even further as I was trying to get the face and the wing in the same focal plane.  I don't have a Pyle guide (maybe Christmas...  ) but songbirds usually moult their body plumage once a year and the wings once or twice yearly.  Comparing this bird with the next photo (taken in May a few years ago) you can see how the yellow lore becomes more prominent with wear while the malar area becomes whiter.  The flank and side streaks become more distinct as well.  You can also see how the areas that are rufous in the greater coverts and secondaries are worn off, adding to the much paler appearance that most of us are used to when we picture a Savannah sparrow in our heads:

Chain link fences aren't really ideal perches photographically speaking, otherwise the second pic would be much nicer (maybe should try to photo-shop in a nice rustic-looking fencepost some winter night).