ML137145191

Age

Not specified

Sex

Not specified

Media notes

Bird second from right, with Wood Sandpiper to its right and 2 Long-toed Stints to its left. Cropped portion of photo taken with only a 5x underwater camera.

Observation details

While surveying the shorebirds, one stint stood out clearly from the Long-toed Stints. It was roughly equivalent in size and shape to the Long-toed Stints, and was distinctly smaller than the Wood Sandpipers and Common Sandpipers, all of which were in close proximity. This bird’s plumage was strikingly uniform and unpatterned for a stint/peep, and very gray in color. The head, back, and wings appeared solid slate gray with little or no patterning. Depending on light angle, the wings sometimes appeared a shade darker than the head and back. A pale gray wash extended across the neck and breast, forming a fairly clear demarcation with the whitish belly. The chin area seemed a bit paler than the breast. The bill was black and quite thin and short, even for a stint/peep, with the slightest of droop to the tip. The bird had a very thin whitish eyering, possibly a bit broken midway — thin, but noticeable. The legs were mostly obscured, so that I could see only the very topmost portion. From this limited view they appeared somewhat intermediate in color — not as yellowish as the Long-toed Stints’ legs, but not jet black either; rather possibly grayish or greenish. Overall the bird’s solid uniform coloration set it apart from the very scalloped-looking Long-toed Stints nearby. The coloration was similar to the Common Sandpipers’ plumage, but this bird was smaller and more compact in shape, lacked the white notch in front of the wing, had a different bill, & did not teeter. From the field marks observed and the bird’s overall appearance I felt it had to be an adult Temminck’s Stint in basic plumage. As the bird readied itself to fly, I got on it and recalled that it was important to observe the tail. The bird flew from the narrow mud bar it had been roosting on across the water to the south end of the pond. As it flew and landed I got a good view of the tail in binoculars. The central retrices appeared completely blackish and the outer retrices appeared completely white. It was a very simple color pattern: white, black, white, in roughly 3 equal portions. Upon reviewing online photos back at my hotel later, the bird’s tail’s appearance matched that shown in photos, in that the white portions of the tail were quite bright and clean, with no grayish hues. When the focal bird later flew back to the narrow mud bar along with a couple of other birds, I failed to get on the correct bird and thus missed observing it in flight again. I also never knowingly heard the bird vocalize. And unfortunately, I also forgot to get a better look at the legs after the bird changed position, although a few of my photos seem to show greenish or pale grayish legs. I figured Temminck’s Stint was a good bird for Palau, so I paid special attention to it, but I did not know that there were no previous records. As a result, I put some effort into documenting it, but not as much as I would have. My documentation is also lacking because I was in Palau on a snorkeling trip and chose to bring only a 5x underwater camera, and not my SX60 birding camera. Big mistake! With the 65x I could have gotten very good photos of the bird, but with the 5x, my cropped zooms are horribly blurry and pixelated due to distance. With 10x Swarovski binoculars in the field, however, I felt I got good views of the bird. Being far more familiar with North American shorebirds than Asian-Pacific shorebirds, if there is anything else this bird could have been, I would be happy to be corrected. While traveling I do not have access to the field guides I have at home, so have not been able to review stint ID in depth. However, I am not aware of any other species that shows the field marks and the overall appearance of the bird I saw, other than basic-plumaged adult Temminck’s Stint.

Technical information

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