Ian’s Bird Of The Week – Chestnut-mandibled Toucan

December 10, 2010 by Ian

Chestnut-mandibled Toucan (Ramphastos swainsonii) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Chestnut-mandibled Toucan ~ by Ian Montgomery

Newsletter – 12/09/10

Guinness Toucan Poster from Ian

I think everybody, birders and non-birders, likes Toucans. They’re one of the iconic, almost cartoonish, animals that were introduced to as young children and I remember Toucans (and Gnus) featuring in posters for Guinness stout in Ireland in the 1950s. Their unbelievably large and colourful bills are so outlandish that it is a delightful shock to come across them in the flesh, particularly in the wild.

The Villa Lapas hotel where I stayed in the Pacific lowlands of Costa Rica had a rainforest canopy trail in its grounds and I checked it out one thundery and gloomy afternoon. The rain held off for most of the trek but, for the most part, the birds didn’t like the weather any more than I did and the light and the dense foliage made it hard to see much less photograph anything. However, repeated raucous calls led me to a pair of Chestnut-mandibled Toucans perched high in an unusually open tree. They proved to be very shy, fell silent as soon as I appeared and flew off into the forest giving me time to take only a few photos. With a length to 61cm/24in, the Chestnut-mandibled is the largest Toucan in Costa Rica. Its range includes most of Central America and Northern South America from Honduras to Ecuador.

Crimson-rumped Toucanet (Aulacorhynchus haematopygus) by Ian

Toucans use their large bills to collect fruit, but will also feed on nestlings. The structure of the bill is a honeycomb, so it quite light and not particularly strong. Its function has attracted a lot of speculation from reaching fruit, signalling and defence and the latest theory is that it is used as heat exchanger for cooling. The colours vary widely from species to species, supporting its use for species identification but they don’t vary either between the sexes or seasonally. There are about a dozen species of large toucan (genus Ramphastos) and the toucan family (Ramphastidae) includes smaller ones such as Mountain-Toucans (Andigena), Toucanets (Selenidera) and Araçaris (Peteroglossus). All of these are restricted to Central and South America but the related Barbets occur also in Africa and Eurasia. If you are interested in examples of these, have a look at: http://www.birdway.com.au/ramphastidae/index.htm.

Recent milestone on the website are totals of 5,600 photos and 1,300 species. Additions to the website since last week include more photos of American waders such as:

American Avocet

Black-necked Stilt

Willet

and Least Sandpiper

Best wishes,

Ian

—

Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,

454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818

Phone: +61-7 4751 3115

Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au

Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

Wow! What a milestone. Way to go Ian. Hope he doesn’t mind, but I inserted one of his photos of a toucanet. Check out Ian’s link above of the Ramphastidae Family.

Gracie the retired Chestnut-mandibled Toucan (Ramphastos swainsonii)

We were able to meet and pet “Gracie” at the National Aviary in Pittsburgh, PA this summer. She is also a Chestnut-mandibled Toucan. Her beak as you can see is showing her age. She is retired now and is well cared for. Like Ian said, “I think everybody, birders and non-birders, likes Toucans.” I definitely think they are very neat.

Its leaves were beautiful and its fruit abundant, and in it was food for all. The beasts of the field found shade under it, and the birds of the heavens lived in its branches, and all flesh was fed from it. (Daniel 4:12 ESV)

The Toucans, as Ian said, are found in the Ramphastidae Family. At present, there are 47 species in the family. They are part of the Piciformes Order which contains the Woodpeckers and their allies.

(Editor’s note – not advocating or advertising Guinnes) *

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Scintillant Hummingbird

November 25, 2010 by Ian

Scintillant Hummingbird (Selasphorus scintilla) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Scintillant Hummingbird ~ by Ian Montgomery

Newsletter – 11/25/10

At the Hotel Savegre (http://www.savegre.co.cr/) where I stayed in the highlands in Costa Rica in pursuit of the Resplendent Quetzal, a variety of Hummingbirds were regular visitors to the hummingbird feeders and the flowers in the garden. The largest of these was the Magnificent Hummingbird, up to 14cm/5.5in in length and 10g in weight – sparrow sized – as in the first photo.

Magnificent Hummingbird (Eugenes fulgens) by Ian

Size, however, isn’t everything particularly in hummingbirds and big ones risk looking like, dare I say it, mere ordinary birds. Much of the fascination in hummingbirds is how insect-like they are, so the smaller the better, and my favourite was the tiny Scintillant Hummingbird. The males, second and third photo, tip the scales at 2.1g with a length of 6.5cm/2.6in (the females average 2.3g and 7cm) and perched, seemingly weightless, on the tips and edges of the leaves of Zantedeschia plants. Their over-sized orange gorgets are very striking and this species is endemic to the mountain slopes of Costa Rica and Western Panama.

Scintillant Hummingbird (Selasphorus scintilla) by Ian

Incidentally, the smallest hummingbird of all, in fact the smallest bird of all, is the Bee Hummingbird of Cuba with the males, again smaller than the females, averaging 1.6g and 5cm/2in, not that much smaller the Scintillant Hummingbird. The largest is the Giant Hummingbird of the Andes, up to 23g in weight and 22cm/8.7in long and apparently swift-like in flight. Not surprisingly, the Bee Hummingbird is on my bucket list, the Giant isn’t.

Our premature wet season continues in North Queensland, so the website has received plenty of attention. I’ve revised the Thrush galleries with the addition of 6 Central American species, added a couple of swallows and the badly-named Long-tailed Silky-flycatcher – it may be silky but it’s not a flycatcher and it mostly eats fruit:

Ruddy-capped Nightingale-Thrush

Black-faced Solitaire

Mangrove Swallow

Long-tailed Silky-flycatcher

Best wishes,

Ian

—

Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,

454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818

Phone: +61-7 4751 3115

Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au

Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

Wow! What gorgeous Hummingbirds. Love that Scintillant’s colors, but the Magnificent is also magnificent. What a creative Hand the Lord used when they were created.

Who does great things, and unsearchable, Marvelous things without number. (Job 5:9 NKJV)

The Hummingbirds belong to the Trochilidae Family of the Apodiformes Order. That Order not only has Hummingbirds, but also Owlet-nightjars, Treeswifts and Swifts.

The colors of the Scintillant fit right in with today’s day of Thanksgiving here in America.

Happy Thanksgiving from all of us on this blog!

Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men! (Psalms 107:8 KJV)

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Violaceous Trogon

November 20, 2010 by Ian

Violaceous Trogon (Trogon violaceus) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Violaceous Trogon ~ by Ian Montgomery

Newsletter – 11/17/10

When the Resplendent Quetzal featured as bird of the week in October, I mentioned that Quetzals are members of the Trogon family, the Trogonidae. So they belong to a splendid lineage as typical Trogons are quite gorgeous in their own right and among my favourite birds. Here is the Violaceous Trogon, also from the Costa Rican trip, though it has a wide range in Central and South America (I have also photographed it in Trinidad).

Violaceous Trogon (Trogon violaceus) by Ian

Trogons, the males in particular, are very colourful and the different species come in an extraordinary variety of colours, invariably in aesthetically pleasing and frequently complementary combinations, i.e. red-green, blue-yellow, purple-orange. Male Trogons with red and green breasts include the Slaty-tailed, Black-tailed, Collared and Masked, while both the Violaceous and the White-tailed are somewhere between blue-yellow and purple-orange, perhaps violet-chrome yellow, first photo. Non-complementary but still lovely are the red-brown male Crimson-rumped and female Masked. (I’ve chosen these examples as all seven are on the Birdway website.)

Their backs are green, bluish or brown, as in the second photo, and if all this is not enough, the upper wing coverts often have subtle and intricate scroll patterns and beautifully barred black and white tails, as in the third photo. If you wanted to design a fantastically beautiful bird yourself, it would be hard to come up with something better: female Trogons clearly have impeccable taste.

Violaceous Trogon (Trogon violaceus) by Ian

Despite their rich colours, Trogons can be hard to spot as they tend to sit fairly motionless in leafy trees in tropical rainforest, occurring in both the New and the Old Worlds. They have distinctive repeated calls that reveal their presence, but hearing one in thick forest is no guarantee of being able to see it. They sit tight, so if you do find them they are fairly approachable but you have to be lucky to find one in clear view.

Ian’s Bird of the Week – White-whiskered Puffbird

November 12, 2010 by Ian

White-necked Puffbird (Notharchus hyperrhynchus) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – White-whiskered Puffbird ~ by Ian Montgomery

Newsletter – 11/11/10

Last week’s Asian Dowitcher prompted an amusing comment about bird names (‘Dowitcher Princess’) from a friend of mine on the list, thank you Peter, so how about the White-whiskered Puffbird, encountered in Carara Reserve on the Pacific Coast of Costa Rica? Puffbirds get their name from their fluffy plumage and along with Nunbirds (black), Monklets (smaller and brown) and Nunlets (oddly, also small and brown) comprise a small Central and South America family of 22 species, all with slightly hooked bills, called the Bucconidae, related to the iridescent Jacamars (Galbulidae).

White-necked Puffbird (Notharchus hyperrhynchus) by Ian

All these bird sit around quietly in forests, and are easily overlooked, waiting for their invertebrate prey to appear, which they then pounce on. The White-whiskered Puffbird, 20cm/8in in length, usually perches close to the understory at a height of 1 to 6m/3 – 30ft and have the reputation of being tame. It nests in holes in the ground, either on a slope or in a bank, and supposedly blocks the entrance to the nest hollow at night with green leaves. It prefers the lowlands and ranges from southern Mexico to the western side of the Andes in Colombia and Ecuador.

Other Costa Rican additions to the website include:
Scarlet Macaw
Double-striped thick-knee
Magnificent Hummingbird

And, for the wader-lovers, more photos of:
Terek Sandpiper
Curlew Sandpiper
Short-billed Dowitcher
Marbled Godwit

Best wishes,
Ian
—
Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:
Bucconidae – Puffbirds are in the Piciformes Order which includes not only the Puffbirds, but also Jacamars, 3 families of Barbets, Honeyguides and Woodpeckers.

With all those new birds added from Costa Rica, you can discern that Ian had a great time on his visit. Now we have some more great photos for us armchair birdwatchers to view.

… we know that “all of us possess knowledge.” This “knowledge” puffs up, but love builds up. If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know. But if anyone loves God, he is known by God. (1 Corinthians 8:1-3 ESV)

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Asian Dowitcher

November 3, 2010 by Ian

Asian Dowitcher (Limnodromus semipalmatus) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Asian Dowitcher ~ by Ian Montgomery

This is something of a postscript to a presentation on wader identification that I gave last Saturday to a workshop organized by the Townsville Region Bird Observers Club as part of the Shorebirds 2020 Project ( http://www.shorebirds.org.au/ ). Of the 45 species that we considered, I lacked photos of just one: the Asian Dowitcher. So you’ll understand why I and a friend jumped into the car after the practical session at Bushland Beach, near Townsville, on Sunday and drove to Cairns, where an Asian Dowitcher had recently been reported, for an overnight visit. They are regular visitors in small numbers to northwestern Australia (e.g. Broome in Western Australia) but occur only as irregular vagrants on the east coast.

Asian Dowitcher (Limnodromus semipalmatus) by Ian

The mudflats on the Esplanade are very flat, so the window of opportunity provided by an incoming tide is very short and it wasn’t until Monday afternoon that that happened. Even so, I would probably have missed it if Guy Dutson hadn’t alerted me to its location. It’s a bird that’s easy to overlook among the Great Knots and Bar-tailed Godwits when they’re all in non-breeding plumage, thank you, Guy! The first photo shows it among Great Knots. The body size is similar, so the key Asian Dowitcher features are the very long, straight, dark bill with a bulbous tip rather like that of a snipe, long dark legs and dark loral stripe (between the bill and the eye). Body length in waders is confounded by bill and leg length, so weight and wing-span are more useful. These are – Asian Dowitcher: 127-245g and 59cm/23.2in; Great Knot: 115-248g and 58cm/22.8in.

The second photo shows the Asian Dowitcher on the left with a smallish – probably male – Bar-tailed Godwit on the right (Bar-tailed Godwit male 190-400g female 262-630g, span 70-80cm/28-32in) and the third photo shows the Dowitcher with a larger Bar-tailed Godwit and lots of Great Knots and in this photo you can see the barred flanks of the Dowitcher compared with the plain flanks of the Godwit. The bill of the Dowitcher was always the most obvious distinguishing feature, but the bird would often have a snooze, tucking its bill under a wing, and magically disappear. What’s more, the mud on the Cairns Esplanade is very gluggy, so the pink bases of Godwit bills are often covered, but the different shape is usually still apparent.

Asian Dowitcher (Limnodromus semipalmatus) by Ian

When I was preparing the presentation and checking carefully on distinguishing features, I found that a wader that I’d photographed in India in 2003 and posted to the website as a Wood Sandpiper was actually a Green Sandpiper. This a bird, rare in Australia, that I had long wanted to photograph, so I was pleased to find and correct the error: http://www.birdway.com.au/scolopacidae/green_sandpiper/index.htm .

Best wishes,
Ian
—
Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

The Asian Dowitcher is part of the Scolopacidae Family which is in the Charadriiformes Order that consists of Shorebirds and their allies. To see Ian’s Birdway website of the Scolopacidae – Click Here.

He answered, “The man called Jesus made mud and anointed my eyes and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ So I went and washed and received my sight.” (John 9:11 ESV)

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Boat-billed Heron

October 30, 2010 by Ian

Boat-billed Heron (Cochlearius cochlearius) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Boat-billed Heron

After I’d photographed the Resplendent Quetzal, my immediate reaction was one of relief: ‘Now I can just relax and enjoy the rest of my time in Costa Rica!’. Needless to say, that didn’t last long and I decided to chase a couple of other species on my bucket list including Scarlet Macaw and Boat-billed Heron. If you’re not familiar with bucket lists, have a look here http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0825232/ – and I hasten to add that I’m not terminally ill!. I enquired at the Hotel Savegre, where I was staying, and they booked me into the Villa Lapas, another eco-lodge-style hotel, but in the lowlands on Puntarenas Province on the Pacific Coast.

Boat-billed Heron (Cochlearius cochlearius) by Ian

‘Lapas’ is the Spanish for Macaw, and that seemed like a good omen, particularly as the hotel is adjacent to the Carara Biological Reserve, supposedly one of the best places in Costa Rica for Scarlet Macaws. Anyway, I checked into the hotel and booked myself on an early morning wildlife boat trip on the Tarcoles River. I was the only passenger, so the crew of two were only too happy to try to satisfying my wishes. Sure enough, within minutes of starting, we got distant views of a pair of Scarlet Macaws feeding on Beach Almonds and after a trip up the river we went down to the mangroves for the climax of the trip, three Boat-billed Herons roosting in the mangroves.

Boat-billed Heron (Cochlearius cochlearius) by Ian

There have got to be the strangest looking herons, with their huge bills, though otherwise they show some resemblance to Night-Herons and are also nocturnal – hence the large eyes. The bill looks it’s designed a heavy duty task like crushing crabs, but in fact it is used rather passively as a scoop and Boat-bills eat a variety of invertebrates and small vertebrates unlucky enough to get in the way. In the past they have been given their own mono-typic family, but DNA research has shown that they are related to both the Tiger-Herons and the Night-Herons.

I first got interested them when reading about them in Trinidad in 2005 where they are rare. Elsewhere in South America they are reasonably common with a range extending from Mexico to northern Argentina. There are five sub-species, sometimes treated as two species, Northern and Southern, but the Costa Rican race (panamensis) is intermediate between the two extremes and it is usual now to treat them as a single species.

I’m enjoying being back home in North Queensland, though the first week here has been a busy one as I’ve been preparing material for a workshop on wader identification tomorrow. When that is out of the way, I can get back to the website and the rest of my domestic routine in earnest.

Best wishes,
Ian
—
Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

the stork, the heron after its kind, and the hoopoe and the bat. (Deuteronomy 14:18 NKJV)

Boat-billed Herons belong to the Ardeidae Family of the Pelecaniformes Order. I am glad Ian managed to get photos of it. We were able to get photos at the National Aviary in Pittsburgh and a Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa, FL. It is really an interesting beak that the Boat-billed has. The Heron is one of the Birds of the Bible.

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Resplendent Quetzal

October 20, 2010 by Ian

Resplendent Quetzal (Pharomachrus mocinno) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Resplendent Quetzal ~ Ian Montgomery

Newsletter 10-18-10

It looks like your collective prayers worked, thank you very much, so here is the legendary Resplendent Quetzal, the main goal of my visit to Costa Rica.

Resplendent Quetzal (Pharomachrus mocinno) by Ian2

After a post-flight night in a hotel in the capital, San Jose, I drove to hotel called the Hotel Savegre ( http://www.savegre.co.cr/ ) in a town called San Gerardo de Dota in a valley in the mountains often now called Quetzal valley. On the following morning, I went out with an excellent guide called Melvin Fernandez who is attached to the hotel ( birdwatchersavegre@hotmail.com ) and within two hours he had taken me to a Quetzal-favoured avocado tree containing two pairs of Quetzals and I had taken photos to my hearts content.

Resplendent Quetzal (Pharomachrus mocinno) by Ian3

The Resplendent Quetzal is regarded as the most spectacular bird in the Americas, and it would be easy to agree. The males are just sensational as you can see in the first three photos. At this time of the year the tail streamers are short, which actually makes photographing them easier as you can fit the whole bird in more easily. They shed the streamers in July and they gradually grow back month by month to their maximum extent of up to 64cm/25in in time for the breeding season.

Resplendent Quetzal (Pharomachrus mocinno) by Ian Female

The female, fourth photo, shows the birds Trogon affinities – they are members of the Trogon family, Trogonidae – and she is quite gorgeous in her own right, though completely eclipsed by her amazing partner.

The adjective legendary is literally the case and the legends and myths focus on three aspects: the divine nature of the bird, the the defeat of the Mayans by the Spanish and its symbolic representation of liberty. You can read all about it here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resplendent_Quetzal and here http://blog.guatemalangenes.com/2009/03/legend-of-quetzal.html so I won’t repeat the details but just say that they add to the magic of the bird.

Resplendent Quetzal (Pharomachrus mocinno) by Ian5

The tail streamers are not tail feathers – the tail is quite trogon-like – but erectible extensions of four of the feathers of the tail coverts, as you can see in the fifth photo. Similarly, the cloak-like feathers across the breast are the wing coverts.

Having photographed these amazing birds, mision completa as they say in Spanish, I was then free to relax and enjoy the rest of my stay in Costa Rica. The adventure, however, had just started and I have plenty of other interesting material for future birds of the week.

If you want to see the Quetzal, I highly recommend the Savegre Hotel. It’s family owned, has delightful gardens and its own primary cloud forest (the hotel is at 2,200m 7,200ft) and lots of trails, is on the Savegre River and Melvin tells me the best months for the Quetzal are February and March – I was there in the wet season and it rained heavily every afternoon.

I’m now back in California, due, flights permitting, to return to Australia tonight and looking forward to getting home.

Best wishes,
Ian
—
Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

I am glad our prayers for your Quetzal were so speedily answered as were the ones for traveling mercies. That bird is a prize catch for most birdwatchers heading to Costa Rica.

Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass. (Psalms 37:4-5 KJV)

To see Ian’s Trogonidae photos – Click Here

The Quetzals are part of the Trogonidae Family in the Trogoniformes Order.

Ian’s Bird of the Week: Clark’s Nutcracker

October 16, 2010 by Ian

Clark's Nutcracker (Nucifraga columbiana) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week: Clark’s Nutcracker ~ by Ian Montgomery

Newsletter – 10-14-10

My apologies for the very late bird of the week. My last week in California was very full, so the flight to Costa Rica last Sunday was the first opportunity to prepare the photos and, owing to internet problems at my first two hotels, I haven’t been able to send this email until now (Thursday) although I wrote it on Monday morning.

Craggy Trail-Lassen Volcanic National Park

This is one of the birds of the week that gets chosen because there’s a good story to go with it. Clark’s Nutcracker is a mountain species, found near the tree-line in coniferous forest or rocky areas, that I’d only seen once before, in Colorado in September 1970 and and last week’s visit to Lassen Volcanic National Park in NE California was my third since 2008 to look for it. The first photo shows the craggy trail recommended by a ranger to Bumpass Hell (I kid you not) my sister, Gillian, and I took to look for it.

Clark's Nutcracker (Nucifraga columbiana) by Ian

Eventually, we returned to the car park empty-handed and went to the rest-rooms shown in the second photo. After I’d emerged, I heard the call we had been listening for, and turned round the find Gillian looking for the source – a Clark’s Nutcracker calling mockingly at us perched the very top of the small pine tree right behind the building, third photo.

Restroom area-Lassen Volcanic National Park

After a few seconds, it then flight right over my head and almost into the camera, fourth photo, to perch on a rock beside the car park, directly in front of the sun, thank you very much, fifth photo. I dodges the inevitable questions from a couple of tourists about the size of my 500mm lens to get in a better position before the bird flew, sixth photo, with its mate down into the very steep valley, never to be seen again.

Clark's Nutcracker (Nucifraga columbiana) by Ian

Many birders will be familiar with the car park list, the ones you find waiting for you when you get back after a long and arduous hike and the rest-room list is a variation on this. And familiar with the advice to take your camera everywhere. EVERYWHERE! And with the settings ready to take photos of the unexpected.

My main target here is the elusive Resplendent Quetzal, so a collective world-wide prayer that I can serve it up to you as the next bird of the week would be greatly appreciated!

Best wishes,
Ian,
—
Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:
I couldn’t help but chuckle about his being ready at all times episode. It reminded me of a verse in Daniel that says,

Now if ye be ready that at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, … (Daniel 3:15 KJV)

I didn’t read where it mentioned the “Clark’s Nutcracker calling mockingly.”

As usual, Ian had another interesting birdwatching experience.

The Clark’s Nutcracker (Nucifraga columbiana) are in the Corvidae – Crows, Jays family of the Passeriformes order.

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Sora

September 29, 2010 by Ian

Sora (Porzana carolina) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Sora (#382) ~ By Ian Montgomery

Newsletter (#382) – 09-29-10

Any birds that are a challenge to see exert a particular fascination. This includes all the night birds – owls, nightjars, etc – and all the skulkers and lurkers. We had a classic skulker, the American Bittern, a couple of weeks ago, and the crakes and rails belong in the same category and the same habitat. In Australia, I’ve never seen a Lewin’s Rail and I’ve never photographed a Spotless Crake. Here in the US, the Clapper Rails at the Baylands Park at Palo Alto are giving me a hard time too, but the Sora, a crake, and the Virginia Rail have been more obliging.

The Sora (Porzana carolina) is very close related to the Australian Spotted Crake (Porzana fluminea) and looks very similar, but lacks the Moorhen-like red spot on the bill. They both live in reedbeds but will sometimes come out into the open to feed, particularly in the evening and when water levels are low, as they are here now in California at the end of a dry summer.

Sora (Porzana carolina) by Ian

I’ve recently visited a park in the hills above San Jose three times looking without success for Golden Eagles, but each time I’ve seen a Sora and twice a Virginia Rail as well. In fact, the bird in the first photo came out into the sunshine to feed on the edge of the reed when we – my sister is here now – were watching for a less cooperative Virginia Rail, that was making a lot of noise. All the crakes and rails have very distinctive, loud calls, so presumably they, like the bittern, have trouble seeing each other too.

Both species are widespread throughout the United Sates and southern Canada, so there’s probably a cautionary tale here about naming species after places, such as Virginia or carolina, though I’m presuming that they weren’t named after people. Both migrate, so crakes and rails will fly quite long distances if they have to – usually at night – and turn up in odd places. Some, like the Buff-banded Rail, widespread in Australia also occurs on coral islands on the Barrier Reef and in the South Pacific, where, with nowhere to hide, it can become quite tame. Others like the Lord Howe Island Woodhen, have gone to the skulking extreme and lost the ability to fly.

Links:

Sora
Australian Spotted Crake
Virginia Rail
Buff-banded Rail

Best wishes,
Ian
—
Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

Well, Ian does it again! I saw a Sora once years ago and still haven’t been able to spot one again here in Central Florida. Ours hide a little more than the one he found. :)

I am glad that he is being successful out there in California. If I was envious, I would be upset, but I am not. I’ll just keep looking.

At any rate, the Sora is part of the Rallidae Family of Rails, Crakes & Coots. There are 131 species in the family. The Rallidaes keep company with the Flufftails, Finfoots, Trumpeters, Cranes and Limpkins who are also in the Gruiformes Order.

The Sora’s breeding habitat is marshes throughout much of North America. They nest in a well-concealed location in dense vegetation. The female usually lays 10 to 12 eggs, sometimes as many as 18, in a cup built from marsh vegetation. The eggs do not all hatch together. Both parents incubate and feed the young, who leave the nest soon after they hatch and are able to fly within a month. (Wikipedia)

Can the papyrus grow up without a marsh? Can the reeds flourish without water? While it is yet green and not cut down, It withers before any other plant. So are the paths of all who forget God; … (Job 8:11-13a NKJV)

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Wilson’s Warbler

September 21, 2010 by Ian

Wilson's Warbler (Wilsonia pusilla) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Wilson’s Warbler ~ by Ian Montgomery

Newsletter – 09-21-10

Here is the attractive Wlson’s Warbler one of the New World Wood-Warblers (family Parulidae) that is quite common in Canada and the western United States. We encountered this one at Point Reyes, an pleasant coastal area and good birding spot just north of San Francisco. With a length of only 12cm/4.75in, the specific name pusilla (small) given to it by Alexander Wilson in 1811 is appropriate.

The Wood-Warblers, so named to distinguish them from the unrelated Old World Warblers, are justifiably popular with American birders, particular during the spring and fall migrations. They come in a wide variety of shapes and colours, with over 50 species (out of a family total of near 120) occurring in North America. Most species spend the winter in Central and South America, a few in the warmer southern states such as California and Florida and during the migration, many birders are on the lookout for Warblers occurring outside their breeding range.

Wilson's Warbler (Wilsonia pusilla) by Ian

Alexander Wilson moved from Scotland to Pennsylvania in 1794 at the age of 28, became interested in ornithology in 1801 and decided in 1802 to publish a book illustrating all the North America birds. This appeared as the nine volume American Ornithology between 1808 and 1814, though Wilson died in 1813 and the ninth volume was completed by his friend George Ord. He met John James Audubon in 1810 and probably inspired him to publish his own book of illustrations, even though Audubon’s reaction to Wilson is described as ‘decidedly ambiguous’. (He declined to subscribe to American Ornithology, felt his own illustrations were much better and, in 1820, decided to publish the ‘greatest bird book ever’.) Seven species of birds are name after Wilson, including two on the Australian list, Wilson’s Phalarope and Wilson’s Storm-Petrel.

I have had a report of a list member having trouble accessing the Birdway website. If you have encountered any such difficulties recently, I’d like to hear from you. Recent additions to the website include:

Black Turnstone
Cassin’s Auklet
Rhinoceros Auklet
Sora
Virginia Rail

Best wishes,
Ian
—
Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

Another winner for Ian. What a pretty little warbler. I like that black cap it is wearing. As he said, they are in the Parulidae Family. You can see his photos of the Parulidaes and then check out the whole family here at the Parulidae Family. There are 120 members in the family at this time.

By them the birds of the heavens have their home; They sing among the branches. (Psalms 104:12 NKJV)

Ian’s Bird of the Week – American Bittern

September 14, 2010 by Ian

American Bittern (Botaurus lentiginosus) by Ian Montgomery

Ian’s Bird of the Week – American Bittern ~ by Ian Montgomery

Newsletter – 9/14/2010

Lightning, they say, doesn’t strike the same place twice. Luck, in bird photography, is rather similar: a missed opportunity usually remains just that. High on my list of American targets was the American Bittern, a cryptic and elusive bird of inaccessible reed beds that had successfully eluded me since I first did some serious birding in the USA exactly forty years ago. Imagine my delight and disappointment when I finally flushed one from reeds on the Feather River at Lake Almanor in NE California last Sunday but wasn’t quick enough to get a photo of it as if flew off. I found it in the viewfinder okay, but the autofocus didn’t as often happens when it gets distracted by a complex background.

American Bittern (Botaurus lentiginosus) by Ian Montgomery

Yesterday, two days later, at Sierra Valley in the Sierra Nevada (‘Snowy Mountains’) I saw a large bird flying towards and past me across more reeds and decided to photograph it even before I realized that it was another Bittern, see the first photo. Shortly later, another more distant one flew past and then I found a couple more lurking in the dwindling area of wetland remaining at the end of a dry summer. Eventually, I startled one in a ditch beside the road which froze in indecision (if in doubt, freeze, is a Bittern maxim) frustratingly close but on the other side of an unpicturesque barbed wire fence.

American Bittern (Botaurus lentiginosus) by Ian Montgomery

Then started a waiting game with an endlessly patient opponent that I was bound to loose. Eventually, I moved along the road away from it in the hope that it would come through the fence to regain the sanctuary of the ditch. In time, it did just that and quite stealthily, second photo. Bitterns are bizarre birds in appearance and behaviour, with extraordinarily effective camouflage and very beautiful plumage. When it had entered a small patch of reeds not much bigger than itself, it vanished, and search as I could with binoculars from a short distant, I never saw it again.

To do the plumage justice, I’ve included cropped enlargements of a couple of photos taken when the bird was behind the barbed wire. The fourth photo shows the gorgeous long neck feathers that drape over the breast and the exquisitely patterned feathers of the wing coverts.

American Bittern (Botaurus lentiginosus) by Ian Montgomery

Worldwide, there are four closely-related species of large Bitterns, one in North America, one in South America, one in Eurasia and Africa and one in Australasia. All have declined in population, but only the Australasian one is classed as endangered. All live in reed beds, all are mainly nocturnal, skulkers and easier to hear than see, particularly in the breeding season when they emit far-carrying booming sounds: presumably, they find each other easier to hear than see.

Links including recent additions:
Australiasian Bittern
Wrentit
White-breasted Nuthatch
Red-breasted Nuthatch
Red-shouldered Hawk
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Chestnut-backed Chickadee
Black-footed Albatross

On an almost totally unrelated subject, Birds Australian North Queensland has had a request from an Australian, Carolyne Hepi, living in a remote area of Papua New Guinea to support the local school by buying their 2011 Birds of Papua calendar, price 20 Australian Dollars. I think it is a great idea. Her email is carolyne_jon@hotmail.com and, if you want more information, I’ll make a copy of the pdf she sent us (size 3.8MB) available on the Birdway website.

Best wishes,
Iab
—
Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

Thanks, Ian, for another great birdwatching adventure for us to read about. Saw an American Bittern in Texas in early 2000 and they are hard to capture in binoculars let alone get a decent photo of them. Great job!

Bitterns are in the Ardeidae- Herons, Bitterns Family which has 14 species world-wide. Also check out Ian’s Ardeidae family photos. The Bitterns are part of the Pelicaniformes Order and are mentioned as a Bird of the Bible.

I will also make it a possession for the bittern, and pools of water: and I will sweep it with the besom(broom) of destruction, saith the LORD of hosts. (Isa 14:23)

Family#26 – Ardeidae
*

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Buller’s Shearwater

September 8, 2010 by Ian

Buller's Shearwater (Puffinus bulleri) by Ian

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Buller’s Shearwater ~ by Ian Montgomery

Newsletter – 09-07-10

Buller's Shearwater (Puffinus bulleri) by Ian

I went on a pelagic boat trip from Monterey shortly after my arrival in California. Buller’s Shearwater was one of three species of Shearwater that we encountered in quite large numbers. The others were the Sooty and the Pink-footed. All three are on the Australian list, though the Pink-footed, which breeds off the coast of Chile, is extremely rare in Australia. Buller’s breeds on islands off New Zealand and both it and the Sooty (breeds in New Zealand, the Falklands and Tierra del Fuego) are regular visitors to both Australia and California in the their annual circuit around the Pacific. Having myself just endured a flight – with considerable artificial aid – across the Ocean, I couldn’t help but be very impressed.

Buller's Shearwater (Puffinus bulleri) and Pink-footed Shearwater (Puffinus creatopus) by Ian

I’ve chosen Buller’s as it is the most elegant and distinctive of the three with very white underparts (first photo), a well-defined black cap, and M-shaped dark markings on the otherwise grey upper surface of the wings (second photo). With a length of 46cm/18in and a wingspan of 100cm/40in it is intermediate in size between the smaller Sooty and the slightly larger Pink-footed. Incidentally, Buller’s Shearwater is the 600th Australian species to be included in the website.

We encountered all three mainly in flight, but also swimming on the surface in mixed flocks. The third photo shows two Buller’s and a Pink-footed. The Pink-footed also has a pale body, but the contrast is less marked and, in flight, the dorsal surface of the wings are relatively uniform in colour. The Sooty, is dark all over except for paler underwing patches.

Buller's Shearwater (Puffinus bulleri) and Black-footed Albatross (Phoebastria nigripes) by Ian

Another common bird on the trip was the Black-footed Albatross, which nests on islands off Hawaii. The fourth photo shows one flying alongside a Buller’s Shearwater and it has about double the wingspan – around 2m/80in – and is comparable in size to the Australian Mollymawks such as the Shy Albatross.

Relatively calm seas with a 2m/6ft swell were ideal for the trip, but it was overcast and rather gloomy for photography. Photo of the day wasn’t a bird but a Pacific White-sided Dolphin, fifth photo, which obligingly soared out of the water when I was idly following it underwater in the viewfinder of the camera. Whales were very much in evidence with Hump-backed, Fin and Blue Whales and a few days later I photographed Grey Whales farther up the coast. Consequently, I’ve added a section on Cetaceans to the Other Wildlife part of the website.

Links:

Buller’s Shearwater
Pink-footed Shearwater
Sooty Shearwater

Pacific White-sided Dolphin by Ian

Cetaceans

Blue Whale
Fin Whale
Humpbacked Whale
Grey Whale
White-sided Dolphin

Best wishes,
Ian

Ian Montgomery, Birdway Pty Ltd,
454 Forestry Road, Bluewater, Qld 4818
Phone: +61-7 4751 3115
Preferred Email: ian@birdway.com.au
Website: http://birdway.com.au

Lee’s Addition:

Another great adventure for Ian and what a shot of that Dolphin! Perfect timing. Great bird shots also.

The Buller’s Shearwater is in the Procellariidae – Petrels, Shearwaters Family. At present there are 86 species in the family including the Petrels, Shearwaters, Fulmars, and Prions. They are part of the Procelliiformes Order which also includes the Albatrosses – Diomedeidae Family which has 21 species.

And he looked on the Kenites, and took up his parable, and said, Strong is thy dwellingplace, and thou puttest thy nest in a rock. (Numbers 24:21 KJV)

Most procellariids’ nests are in burrows or on the surface on open ground, with a smaller number nesting under the cover of vegetation (such as in a forest). All the fulmarine petrels bar the Snow Petrel nest in the open, the Snow Petrel instead nesting inside natural crevices. Of the rest of the procellariids the majority nest in burrows or crevices, with a few tropical species nesting in the open. There are several reasons for these differences. The fulmarine petrels are probably precluded from burrowing by their large size (the crevice-nesting Snow Petrel is the smallest fulmarine petrel) and the high latitudes they breed in, where frozen ground is difficult to burrow into. The smaller size of the other species, and their lack of agility on land, mean that even on islands free from mammal predators they are still vulnerable to skuas,[28] gulls and other avian predators, something the aggressive oil-spitting fulmars are not. The chicks of all species are vulnerable to predation, but the chicks of fulmarine petrels can defend themselves in a similar fashion to their parents. In the higher latitudes there are thermal advantages to burrow nesting, as the temperature is more stable than on the surface, and there is no wind-chill to contend with.

Lee's Birdwatching Adventures Plus

Birdwatching from a Christian Perspective

Author Archives: Ian

Ian’s Bird Of The Week – Chestnut-mandibled Toucan

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Scintillant Hummingbird

Happy Thanksgiving from all of us on this blog!

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Violaceous Trogon

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Ian’s Bird of the Week – Resplendent Quetzal

Ian’s Bird of the Week: Clark’s Nutcracker

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Sora

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Wilson’s Warbler

Ian’s Bird of the Week – American Bittern

Ian’s Bird of the Week – Buller’s Shearwater

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