First and best grebe of 2013

Of course I reserve the right to change the title should a Clarks lose its direction.

Here's the Western Grebe that's been ringing in the New Year at Tiscornia.  It took me a few days (and Tim's direction) to locate it.

Here's a look at its other side...

Clark's is eliminated by the dull yellow-green bill with fairly extensive dark bleeding in on both mandibles (it would have much more orange tones and is supposed to have a much cleaner dark line at the upper edge of the upper mandible), as well as the black well below the eye and the crown, neck, and back being the same shade of black.

With this, the Solitaire, and the California Gull I've managed 3 birds that can't be counted on for a county year list.  Last year it was mid-May before I had 3 birds this rare.

I'm not sure how many butterfly records there are for Michigan in January, but I saw this guy fluttering on one of my lights in the kitchen earlier this week.

I'm assuming that it hatched from an unseen chrysalis in the Christmas tree or a centerpiece.

Miss California's at the landfill

Tim and I swung through the south county earlier.  We spent some time at the Forest Lawn landfill and were just about to leave when he picked an adult California Gull off the front face.  The bird stayed just long enough for me to get a look through his scope before the entire flock took off.

I blasted blindly at them not knowing if the bird would come back.  Can you pick out the California?

It turns out it's there more or less centered, the upper left corner of the inset points to it.

After a few anxious minutes not expecting to have documented the bird it returned and settled back down on the southern face of the dump

Midday lighting with the bird shot through a chain link fence with the inevitable wind distortion didn't make for great shooting, but the long straight bill with black and red sub-terminal tip, leg color and darker mantle color is there.

Fortunately the birds took off again, though this time more slowly.  Nevertheless, if you think it's easy to follow one essentially identical gull out of at least 500 others through a chain-link fence and a view-finder with birds milling in both directions and clouds of starlings periodically chaffing the target, well feel free to try it.

California Gull has a bit more black in the primaries than does the average HERG or RBGU and a little heavier head streaking which streamed out from behind the eye.  A look at the upperside:

If you decide you want to try your luck, make sure you sign in at the landfill office.  This was the 3rd California Gull I've seen in Berrien; the county accounts for more Cal Gulls than the rest of the state combined.

Slipping into 2013

Between the end of Christmas Vacation and a fairly dense schedule I haven't gotten out a ton yet.  Hopefully this will lighten up later this month.

This Red-shouldered was one of a pair that was perched up in nice light as I went by a few miles from my house earlier this week.  It took off when a garbage truck went by.

 

I did make a trek down one morning for the Solitaire.  It seems to have noticeably less berries on its cedar than it did 6 weeks ago.



The lighting was brutal early on an overcast morning.

Other than that I've mostly just been watching the feeders and playing around with settings on the camera.  I usually have a White-throated Sparrow or two try to winter in the river bottom.  They usually start coming into the feeder when snow cover develops.

Finally a nuthatch that flew just as I shot.  I'm not sure if the dark P1 and P2 are retained older feathers or if those feathers are typically darker, will just have to keep shooting to try to figure it out...

I've had more redpolls (and cowbirds) than I typically do at the feeders this year, hopefully will have some decent redpoll shots soon.

Birthday Kittiwake

I haven't gotten out to the beach very much lately so it was fun to see a kittiwake this morning.  I picked the bird up in the bins giving a vague hooded impression with an odd flight style.  The wings are proportionately long and coupled with the paler outer wing and a somewhat whippier wingbeat reminiscent of a medium sized tern the flight was very different from the Ring-billed that it roughly approximates in size impression.

When the bird flew past originally I was atop the dune and it was a quarter mile out.  It headed out past the end of the pier, but then hooked back and settled onto the water.  It was at that point I got to demonstrate to myself just how out of shape I am when I ran down to the car to grab the bread bag and then alternated jogging with triple-timed walking out to the end.  Based on GoogleMaps it's about 600 yards in a straight line over the water from the overlook to the white lighhouse.  That turns into half a mile of actual land to cover.  The bird ultimately ignored the bread but it was at least a lot closer when it did take off to go south.

The bird has the adult "dipped in ink" primary tips, but also some black along the leading edge of the wing retained from the juvenile Kittiwake plumage (with the heavy black M) making it a 2nd winter bird.  It has the adult gray (rather than black) nape.  In the overcast light the outerwing was noticeably brighter than the gray innerwing. 

The overcast made it difficult to get great shots.  To compare the new camera with the old here's the bird from the overlook today over the river.  Not great, but probably ID-able.

Here's an adult Kittwake from a couple years ago at a similar distance (though sunny glare-y) light and probably much more wind distortion, probably not really an apples to apples comparison, but still:

I'm guessing this is probably the last year-bird of the year, though I'm still missing a couple potentially gettable owls depending on motivation levels.

CBC7D

Today was the St Joseph CBC which I've participated in almost every year I've lived here.  Red-throated Loons are still write-up birds even though they're common on southern Lake Michigan.  This one was photographed off-shore.  



I recently switched to the 7D body from the 40D.  I haven't had a ton of opportunity to play with it.  One of its improvements is better low light sensitivity.  This is a 2nd year Glaucous from this morning.  It's hard to do an apples to apples comparison, but trust me that this turned out a lot better than it would have before.

Here's another distant poorly lit bird from the CBC, a light-morph Roughleg that had a masked face and mask.  To the naked eye the face and breast looked a lot darker giving it a somewhat Swainson's like appearance.

You'll have to trust me again that there's a lot more detail on this cropped in shot than otherwise would have been there.

 

One final offshore photo with the old camera, an oddly pale billed Herring Gull



Changing the mantle

After entirely too many posts (don't think it'll stop me in the future) on Gull-nasty, the dark-mantled Chandeleur type gull (Kelp x Herring), I have a different dark-mantled hybrid for your viewing pleasure.

This bird was off New Buffalo.  When I first picked it up, seeing a nearly entirely white headed gull with a noticeably darker mantle than the average Herring Gull, but lighter than a typical graelsii Lesser Black-backed I had hopes for a Vega or Yellow-legged Gull.  As we got closer though the mantle seemed a bit dark for either and the bird was globe-headed with a heavy bill even for a Herring Gull.  You can get a sense of the heft of the bill and the jaw compared to the HERG in the foreground:

A flight shot ...

The one pic of GBBG x HERG in Howell and Dunn has a slightly larger mirror on P9, but I'm sure this is still within the range of variation.  It shares the subterminal white spot "pearl" on P7.

It made a couple close passes at our bread.  I kept shooting to try to get the orbital color...

It's orange or red-orange, both black-backs have red orbitals per Sibley, HERG has yellow-orange.

So, to summarize the intermediate characters on this bird, body size and bill larger and heavier than HERG arguing strongly for GBBG, mantle intermediate between HERG and a black-back, orbital intermediate, the feet are pink pretty close to a typical HERG and not like the much paler pink feet of a GBBG.  The intensely pink feet, large size, and minimal head markings are pretty strong arguments against LBBG as the black-backed parent.

While it's always hard to compare shades of gray in a photo, I think that these pics are pretty representative of the relative shades, here's a Lesser Black-back from the same flock at virtually the same time:

Lesser seems to moult later than do the other gulls, this one is a bit asymmetric with an old P10 on one side and a fresh P10 still growing in on the other.

The one day pelagic season

For a number of reasons yesterday was the first time this year we got out on the boat.  I'm guessing that it was the last day this year we got out on the boat.  The big loon flock that stages some years off Lakeside seemed to have moved on, we only saw the winter resident Red-throats.  We were able to chum in good numbers of gulls which would frequently move past inside of comfortable camera range.  There wasn't a ton of diversity of species, but there were a handful of Thayer's class birds over the day.

This juvenile stopped by briefly and landed quite backlit so I only had a handful of shots at it.

The prominent secondary bar and the longish bill probably elminates Iceland fairly easily.

Next is a 3rd winter bird.

A couple of flight views:

I think the tail is too dark to be an Iceland.  In adults Kumlien's Iceland is said not to have subterminal markings on P5 which this bird has.  About 90-95% of my 2nd and 3rd year Herring gulls shots have light eyes, Iceland usually has light eyes so the dark eyes are supportive of Thayers; I don't know how fast Iceland typically gets light eyes though.  P9 has dark along the entire leading edge which in adults is very good evidence for pure Thayer's.  The bill does have some pinkish tones which Olsen and Larsson note in Thayer's; Iceland at this age trends more towards greenish tones to the yellow.
I like this next shot mainly for the way the wings are catching the air; you can get a sense of the curvature that gives them lift.

Finally an adult bird...

Its eye is on the light end of the spectrum for Thayers (Howell and Dunn describe it as dirty yellowish to dark).  It's heavily hooded as in Thayer's.  The wing pattern with a tiny fleck on P5, and a very very narrow black leading edge to P9, and very little subterminal black on P10 is a little borderline.  Howell and Dunn show this pattern for Thayers-Kumlein intergrade in one of their (borrowed) plates, Olsen and Larsson would seem to put this wing pattern more solidly in the Thayer's camp based on their spreadwing plate.

Other pics I've posted ... adult Thayers Gull (also from boat last year), and a Thayer's type.

And coming soon to a blog near you, (drumroll please), a different dark-mantled hybird!!!