ML191830811

Age

Not specified

Sex

Not specified

Observation details

This relatively small shorebird was a little larger and somewhat different in shape than the Spotted Sandpipers that we saw in the same area. The bill was just slightly longer than the head was wide, and it tapered from a base of medium depth to a blunt tip along a culmen that was straight, yet with the lower mandible curved subtly downward giving the bill a drooped appearance. The forehead was relatively steep, but the crown was more gently rounded. The neck was of medium-length and despite having a stout base where it met the body, it was slim where it reached a head that seemed small for the bird’s size. The body was plump, full-chested, and with a posture that was midway between horizontal and diagonal. I further noted that the elongate wings reached the tip of a tail that appeared to be of medium length, and also that the extension of the primaries beyond the tertials was at least half the length of the exposed tertials; however, I was not sure if this bird had all of the tertials intact. The legs were relatively long, but unremarkable in their mass for a sandpiper of this size, and this bird still had a limp that reflected a bad right foot. When seen in flight, this was a relatively small, plump shorebird with a medium-length tail and wings that tapered from broad bases to pointed tips. This bird was well-marked and moderately colorful. The crown was sooty-brown to blackish in color with fine streaks of buff and a narrow, whitish line that extended back along either side of the crown. Demarcating the dark cap was a diffuse supercilium that was dull whitish to pale buff, but the finely streaked face did not contrast all that conspicuously with the supercilium, unlike the narrow, dark loral-stripe that connected the base of the bill with the eye. The auriculars and lower part of the face were finely streaked with dusky on a dull whitish to light-buff background, but the throat was whitish and unmarked. The front and sides of the neck, along with the breast and sides, were finely streaked with sooty-brown on a background that was again pale buff to dull whitish, and I noted that the lower edge of the streaked region on the breast and sides tapered to a point in the center of the lower breast, from which it angled upward to the shoulders along a sharp line of demarcation. Apart from some streaking on the foreflanks, I noted no obvious streaking below the breast, with the belly, most of the flanks, and the undertail coverts white and unmarked. The back and scapulars contrasted sooty with pale fringes to create a striped pattern. Rufous fringes to the scapulars were narrow but well defined, and thus creating a conspicuous pattern of colorful striping. I was less sure of the pattern on the mantle, but I did note some suggestion of white braces separating the mantle and scapulars. The wing coverts had dusky centers that contrasted with narrow, yet well-defined, edges of cinnamon-buff on both the inner and outer webs to create a wedge-shaped pattern on each feather, and with most feathers also having a blackish shaft-streak. I am not now as certain about the pattern on the greater coverts, but I think they too had narrow fringes on at least their outer edges, and I am confident that the cinnamon to pale-rufous edges to the tertials were responsible for the striped pattern to the rear part of the wing. I nevertheless thought the primary tips visible beyond the longest tertials were rather uniformly black. I thought the spread wings, seen when this bird was in flight, had a uniform appearance that showed at most a minimal wing-stripe, that the rump and tail were mostly dark, and that the sides of the rump had at least some white that constricted the dark coloration that extended down the center. The bill was a dull, olive-yellow basally, yet blending to blackish on the distal half. The eyes were dark. The legs and feet were a relatively bright yellow, but I thought the bad foot was darker.

Technical information

Model

COOLPIX P900

ISO

500

Focal length

357 mm

Flash

Flash did not fire, auto

f-stop

f/6.5

Shutter speed

1/125 sec

Dimensions

2647 pixels x 1986 pixels

Original file size

893.21 KB