Answer - ID Challenge #1

Well, perhaps I give too many clues but 7 people responded and they all guessed correctly (though many admitted that they wouldn’t have guessed without all my clues) – this is the Sooty morph of Vermillion Flycatcher that is locally common in some parts of South America. For comparison, here are some photos of the “typical” morph. If you look closely you can see the structural similarity, although note that the sooty morph has less of that “shaggy crested” appearance in these photos (due to posture)…

Stay tuned for more challenegs and a series from Peru...

ID challenge #1

Hi folks! I have decided to spice up this blog with the odd ID challenge, of an international flavour of course. Here is the first ID challenge – you can post your response in comments or send me an email. I will post the answer as a comment in 10 days from the time of posting.

This first one shows a common North American passerine, that many readers will be familiar with, but in an uncommon form that may stump you. Take a look at the two photos below and see how you do... You can click on the photos to view them at a larger size and/or scroll down below the photos for clues if you like…

Who am I?

1. In North American I breed in southern Texas, New Mexico and Arizona (plus a little part of California) but I also occur in the Neotropics

2. I am a highly sexually dimorphic species although either sex may occur in the form shown in these photographs

3. I am about 15cm or 6 inches in length

4. I am very high on the list of “birds to see before you die”

5. Both my scientific genus name and specific name refer to my colour (but not the colour of the form shown here)... in fact I am called the “Ruby Firehead” and I impress everyone I meet!

Who am I?

Northern Saw-whet Owl

Northern Saw-whet Owls are very common in Manitoba in the breeding season but birders do not usually see a lot of them in migration, unless, that is, you visit a banding station like Delta, where large numbers of migrating Saw-whets are banded every year. So, when one showed up in a friend’s yard, I made the trip across Winnipeg to snap some photos. Here are two portraits of this owl as they are waking up at dusk, having moved from the denser branches where they roosted out onto a more open perch.

Once on the open perch, with a bit more space, the owl began stretching their wings before taking off. This is a typical action that I have seen many species of owls, large and small do - stretching the wing downward at full extension while tensing the body and pushing upward... a good pre-flight work out for the flight muscles!

White-winged Dove in Manitoba

I will return to posting about Peru as soon as possible but can’t resist adding a couple of quick posts first. A White-winged Dove showed up in Great Falls, Manitoba on 10th November. This is an extreme rarity this far north and represents, more or less, the fifth record for this province (including a couple of unconfirmed reports). Thanks to the remarkable generosity of Heather and Paul Softley, many people got to see this subtly beautiful bird. Here are a few souvenirs…