ML261277031
Contributor
Date
Location
- Age
- Not specified
- Sex
- Not specified
Observation details
**Very rare! CJS was pishing at a Blackburnian Warbler in the spruce stand at the north end of Bluegrass Lane when TPH, who was manning the scope, screamed for CJS to look at a large, slender-bodied, gull-like bird circling high to the north, over Tareyton Drive where Jay McGowan saw the bird from. CJS took a single look through his bins and started sprinting towards TPH shouting, “Is that a Frigatebird?!” TPH, looking through the scope, followed the bird at 80x zoom as it came directly overhead and then had to reposition to follow it south where it did a second circle before we lost it. CJS followed it with bins and luckily snapped a couple digibinned photos of the bird. At first glance the bird gave off interesting wing shapes, a very concave then convex leading edge with very sharp tips. The bird was mottled underneath with a pale breast band/patch and the wings showed light patches, although, the light was not in our favor and so all other details were hard to make out. The flight pattern was unlike any gull in the region, with not much depth to the flaps but most of the movement that was there, in the hands of the wings, almost like it was swimming through the air. Based on the slenderness of the bird and the patterns we did get to see, along with the supporting digibinned photos and flight style, we determined this to be a dark, juvenile Long-tailed Jaeger with some intermediate plumage.
Technical information
- Camera
- Microphone
- Accessories
- Original file size
- 428.67 KB