PEEPS

Black-capped Gnatcatcher - Southeast Arizona

A family of Black-capped Gnatcatchers, Polioptila nigriceps, has been observed in the Proctor Road area of Madera Canyon in the Santa Rita Mountains of Southeast Arizona, last reported by Melody Kehl, on 4 July.  Although Black-capped Gnatcatcher is considered an endemic to northwest Mexico, it has bred irregularly in Arizona, more frequently in recent years. It was first discovered in the U.S., when a family of five, including three fledglings, were collected along Sonoita Creek, a few miles northeast of Nogales, Santa Cruz County, Arizona, on 22 June 1971. The discovery and description of the birds was reported by Allan Phillips, et. al. in The Auk,Vol.90, No.2, (April 1973). 

This species is best detected by its mewing call, or its Lucy's Warbler-like metallic tink.  In Mexico, this species is found in gallery forest, tropical deciduous forest, and arid lowland scrub.  The small range of Black-capped Gnatcatcher includes the Mexican states of central Sonora, Sinaloa, Nayarit, Jalisco, to northernmost Colima.  Although at times it has been considered conspecific with White-lored Gnatcatcher of Mexico's Pacific lowlands and interior valleys, Black-capped Gnatcatcher differs from White-lored in morphology and vocalizations.

Berylline Hummingbird - Southeast Arizona

Berylline Hummingbird (Amazilia beryllina), is casual in summer to the mountain islands of Southeast Arizona. Madera Canyon, in the Santa Rita Mountains, Santa Cruz County, has been the spot for this rarity this summer.  First seen on 7 June by Melody Kehl, a pair have been seen and photographed irregularly in the Kubo area along the Madera Canyon Road (the spot to look for Flame-colored Tanager in the past).  Photographs of both sexes can be seen at www.azfo.org/gallery/BEHU_Madera_Halsey_20080622.html.

North of Mexico there are four species of Amazilia hummingbirds that have occurred including Berylline, Buff-bellied, Violet-crowned, and Cinnamon Hummingbirds. Berylline Hummingbird males can be distinguished from congeners by their rufous wing patches that can be strikingly bold in flight.  Dull buff bellies and bright emerald-green throats and chests, and dark uppertail coverts are diagnostic of males of this species.  Members of Amazilia show at least a reddish base to their bills with dark maxillae, on a long thin bill, and many Amazilias have mostly red bills (Buff-breasted, Violet-crowned, and Cinnamon Hummingbirds).

The word Amazilia comes from Amazili, an Inca heroine in a French novel by Jean Francois Marmontel, and was given to the members of this genus by the French naturalist, Rene Lesson (Lesson's Seedeater).  Emerald, the precious stone, is a type of beryl that also includes aquamarine, thus the common name.

Berylline Hummingbird is species whose range extends from Honduras north into northern Mexico. In Mexico, it is found in oak-dominated foothills, but it is also found in temperate forests in parts of its range.  In the U.S., it has been found in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, where it has shown preference for mountain canyons. Berylline Hummingbird has been documented breeding in Arizona, and is known to hybridize with other hummingbird species.

Western Spindalis - Key West, Florida

A female Western Spindalis, Spindalis zena, was reported on 20 June at Fort Zachary Taylor State Park in Key West, Florida. The bird was observed by Mark Hedden and his group along a strip of vegetation between the first parking area on the right and the entrance road, a few hundred yards from the entrance gate.

Formerly a single species called Stripe-headed Tanager, the species was split to form four species with Western Spindalis the only species recorded, so far, in the ABA Area.  The genus Spindalis is restricted to the West Indies and may be related to the Thraupis tanagers which they resemble in plumage and feather structure.  Western Spindalis is a polytypic species, represented by five endemic subspecies, and is a resident of the Bahamas, Cuba, Isle of Pines, Grand Cayman Island, and Cozumel Island off of Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. The original Stripe-headed Tanager was first described by Lineaus in 1758 and was called "The Bahama Finch" in the Natural History of Carolina by Catesby. 

It was the striking differences in the plumages of the females, as well as vocalization differences, that led ornithologists to split Stripe-headed Tanager into Western Spindalis, the endemic Hispaniolan Spindalis (S. dominicensis) of the Dominican Republic and Haiti, the Puerto Rican Spindalis (S. portoricensis) of Puerto Rico, and the Jamaican Spindalis (S. nigricephala) from Jamaica. Stripe-headed Tanager was renamed in 2000, the change made known in the Forty-second Supplement to The American Ornithologists’ Union Check-list of North American Birds.  The original Spindalis zena became the bird we now call Western Spindalis.  Basis for this four-way split came from a paper written in The Wilson Bulletin, 109 (4), 1997. pp.  561-594, titled "Taxonomy of the Striped-headed Tanager, Genus Spindalis (Aves:Thraupidae) of the West Indies" by O.H. Garrido et. al.

Bahama Mockingbird - Florida

Yesterday, June 18, Roy Morris and Chris Rasmussen found a Bahama Mockingbird at Dagny Johnson Key Largo Hammock State Botanical Park, Monroe County.  The bird was feeding on tree fruits in the area of the paved trail leading you to the ruins of an old building.   See http://www.birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/FLRB.html#1213834303 for details and directions, including how to obtain the required permit to be able to visit the area where the bird was discovered.

Bahama Mockingbird is large mocker, an inch longer than Northern Mockingbird, with narrow wingbars and brown, not gray back, with streaks on its flanks, a dark malar stripe, and a long tail.  It has dark lores, a mottled face. a pale supercilium, underparts light gray, and the outer tail is tipped with white.  It is more secretive than Northerns; its song is repetitive, but not known to mimic other species. It is a range-restricted species, found in the Cuba, Bahama, and Jamaica EBAs. It is an ABA Code 4 bird, accidental in the U.S., but only in South Florida.

Little Egret - Deleware

Little Egret, Egretta garzetta, is the European counterpart of Snowy Egret of the Western Hemisphere and in most plumages it is remarkably similar.  On 7 June Devich Farbotnik found a Little Egret at Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuge near Smyrna, Delaware. The bird has been reported frequenting the refuge for the past week.

Little Egret can best be told from Snowy Egret in the breeding season when it develops two, or sometimes three, very long nape plumes.  Lanceolate plumes develop on the throat, and slightly recurved plumes develop on the back.  Compared to Snowy, the legs of Little are more extensively black, without the yellow backs to the tarsi that Snowies obtain.  The yellow lore of Little Egret can take on a reddish cast at the height of breeding, but only from late spring to early summer.  Comparing the shape of the head of Little Egret with Snowy, Little can show a slightly longer face with a slightly less tapering, longer bill.

When feeding, Snowy Egret often holds its neck coiled, whereas Little often assumes the posture and hunting method employed by Great Egret, i.e. standing tall and walking slowly.

The taxonomy of Little Egret has been controversial and until recently some authors lumped Western Reef-Heron and Intermediate Egret with Little Egret.  In The Herons Handbook, James Hancock and Jim Kuslan lump Western Reef-Heron with Little Egret and Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 1, treats Little Egret as being polymorphic, including the dark Western Reef-Heron.  However, both the A.O.U. Check-list Committee and the ABA Checklist Committee list Little Egret and its closest relatives as separate species.  The newest The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World, Sixth Edition, separates Western Reef-Heron as a good species, but some authors treat the dimorpha subspecies of Little Egret as Madagascar Dimorphic Egret, a separate species.  Although Little Egret is an ABA Code-4  bird, the European range of this species is expanding and some authors predict that Little Egret may become established in North America.

Bill Maynard
Editor - Winging It

Rufous-tailed Robin - St. Paul Island, Alaska

On 8 June an amazing find was made of a Rufous-tailed Robin, Luscinia sibilans on St. Paul Island in the Alaska Priblof Islands. This bird was discovered by Greg Thomson and Luke DeCiccio on Hutchinson Hill on the northeast part of St. Paul Island. Not currently on the ABA Checklist or that of the A.O.U., it will be carefully scrutinized by both checklist committees before it can be accepted as a first North American record.

Don't bother getting out any of your North American field guides because this member of the Muscicapidae, or Old World Flycatcher Family, will not be found in any of them.  This is an enigmatic species, called Rufous-tailed Thrush or Robin and placed in the Muscicapidae in the Clements Checklist of the Birds of the World, Sixth Edition, and placed in the Turdidae or Thrush Family in Handbook of the Birds of the World, Volume 10.  It is sometimes placed in the genus Erithacus where it becomes a monotypic genus.  I can not find it listed in Peter Clement's book,Thrushes. 

Rufous-tailed Robin is a migratory species, mostly insectivorous, breeding in the forest in the taiga of northeastern Asia and as far south as Mongolia.  In winter it retreats to Southeast Asia and southern China.  In appearance it is very similar to Catharus thrushes, most  similar to Hermit Thrush and Veery. This bird often flicks its tail and is often found on its breeding grounds in the undergrowth, often on the ground in broadleaf evergreen and semi-evergreen bottomland forests having dense undergrowth with associated fallen trees and thickets.  In winter Rufous-tailed Robin is said to use fung shui woodland (no joking).

Other names this species has been called include Swinhoe's Robin and Whistling Nightingale. When treated as a true thrush, it is taxonomically closest to Siberian Blue Robin, Luscinia cyane, a species recorded on Attu Island in 1985.

Rufous-tailed Robin is pictured on Plate 20 in de Schauensee's The Birds of China, page 239 and called Swinhoe's Red-tailed Robin in my early edition of A Field Guide to the Birds of Japan, on Plate 36 in Birds of the USSR, on Plate 70 in Robson's A Guide to the Birds of Southeast Asia, where he treats it as a member of the Old World Flycatchers, and pictured nicely on Plate 71 in Volume 10 of Handbook of the Birds of the World, although if current thought holds true, it should then be placed in the Muscicapadidae in Volume 11.   

Bill Maynard
Editor - Winging It

European Storm-Petrel - Offshore Cape Hatteras

On 20 May, enough European Storm-Petrels, Hydrobates pelagicus, were seen on a Brian Patteson pelagic off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, to reduce the species' status from ABA Code 5 (accidental, seen five or fewer times in the ABA Area) to a Code 4 (casual, species not recorded annually in the ABA Checklist Area, but with six or more total records—including three or more in the past 30 years—reflecting some pattern of occurrence) or lower.  Those lucky enough to have booked this trip were also treated to a Fea's Petrel, Pterodroma feae, (still considered Fea's/Zeno's Petrel by ABA Checklist Committee).

As Brian Patteson remarked in Winging It, February 2008, European Storm-Petrel was first recorded in the ABA Area as a photographed bird, east of Cape Hatteras on 27 May 2003.  European Storm-Petrel is a common storm-petrel of the temperate North Atlantic, breeding on rat-free islands off many coastal European countries, on Mediterranean Islands, and on the Canary Islands.

It is identified by its small size, white blaze on the underwings, and when in flight, by the the position of its wings, showing a steeper "V" than in Wilson's Storm-Petrel. "Euro's" are square-tailed and short-legged, the feet never projecting behind it's tail.  The species is portrayed in the National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America, Fifth Edition, but not in the big Sibley guide.  Late May and offshore Cape Hatteras are the key elements to encountering this species.

Black-tailed Gull - Shemya Island, Alaska

On 22 May, Mike Schwitters found an adult Black-tailed Gull, Larus crassirostris, on Shemya Island, Alaska (see previous post) . 

Black-tailed Gull is a medium-sized, four-cycle gull from coastal northeast Asia.  In western Alaska, it is considered a vagrant.  Remarkably, there is even a Black-tailed Gull record from Belize.  This is a distinctive species with slaty-gray upperparts, pale yellow eye, yellow legs, distinctive long bill with a black-and-red tip.  Its common name describes the broad subterminal black tail band while crassirostris refers to "thick billed".   A photograph of the bird can be seen on www.surfbirds.com and a lengthy description of all four cycles can be found in Gulls of the Americas by Howell and Dunn.

Lesser Sand-Plover - Shemya Island, Alaska

On May 20, about 1200 miles southwest of Anchorage, Alaska, two Lesser Sand-Plover (formerly Mongolian Plover), Charadrius mongolus, were discovered by Bob Trotter.  The birds were discovered on Shemya Island, part of the Near Islands of the Aleutian Island chain.  Shemya Island is a closed military installation with special permission required to visit.  Birding is adjunct to the operations occurring at Shemya and is conducted by either military personnel or contractors while off-duty. Shemya is home to the COBRA DANE radar system that was built in 1976 for the primary mission of intelligence gathering in support of verification of the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT) II agreement. 

Photographs of both birds, photographed by Bob Trotter, can be seen at www.surfbirds.com. Lesser Sand-Plover is a rare but regular visitor to western Alaska in the spring. It is casual in the interior of Alaska where it has bred. There are currently five recognized subspecies, placed into two groups, which some authors consider to be separate species. To date, all North American records have been identified as being members of the "Mongolian Plover" or northern group in the subspecies stegmanni, which breeds on the Kamchatka and Chukotski Peninsulas and on the Commander Islands. The northern group is characterized by having more brick-colored (not orangish) chest bands and by their extensive white foreheads, absent in the southern group.  The southern group is often called Lesser Sand-Plover, thus confusing the issue.

Wood Sandpiper - Delaware

First discovered in on 5 May, a Wood Sandpiper, Tringa glareola, was found by Sharon Lynn at Braodkill Beach Impoundment, part of Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge, Delaware. The bird is still being seen as of 12 May.  Although accidental in the Lower 48, and much more so on the East Coast, Wood Sandpiper is sometimes uncommon in flocks of other Scolpacidae in northwestern Alaska, especially the Outer Aleutians, where it has bred.

As the shortish bill of this Tringa suggests, members of the tribe, Tringini, forgo the probing style of other sandpipers, but instead use their visual acuity to locate pray, which they chase and snatch in a manner similar to plovers. An abundant species with an estimated European population of about 1.4 million birds, as many as one million individuals of this long-distance migrant winter in Southeast Asia and in east and central Africa. 

In appearance, Wood Sandpiper is most similar to its congener, Green Sandpiper, T. ochropus, although in North America, it most closely resembles a Solitary Sandpiper, but with longer and slightly more yellow legs, shorter bill, slightly larger overall, and with a less attenuated body.  In flight, its call is described as being similar to Greater Yellowlegs, but more shrill.

Bill Maynard
Editor - Winging It