Sunday, February 20, 2011

Cassin you say Western Kingbird?


MYSTERY KINGBIRD

I guess he's a Cassin's Kingbird.  Click on the picture, and he'll pop up full-sized on your screen.  He was lighter than this photo shows:

The angle makes him look smaller ie.e younger than he is i.e. like a fledgling.  This is merely foreshortening caused by the perspective from which I took the photo. 

His tail feathers had no buff tips like those of a Cassin's Kingbird, and no white edges, like those of a Western KIngbird.  The black lores are real.

The reason that you do not see the white chin spot of a Cassin's is that he does not have it: his face is the same homogeneous gray all over.  Like I said, he's lighter gray than the photo implies.

I suppose he's a Cassin's Kingbird who is moulting into spring plumage.  The book I should consult is buried under a pyle of books.  Get it?  A pyle of books?  Oh, I crack myself up, sometimes!

AND NOW, FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT
JOSHUA TREE FOREST
February 2011
PALMDALE, LOS ANGELES COUNTY, CALIFORNIA
Counting phalaropes on Lake Palmdale with 7X35 binoculars:
Katona Istvan (left and Varga Csaba (right)

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