ML367836501

Age

Not specified

Sex

Not specified

Observation details

CONFIRMED by eBird reviewers on the day and by OBRC in July 2022. At 10:36 this morning there was an unusual plover on Beach 2. It was at an extreme distance and appeared at first to be a Piping Plover. I was able to get one very distant photo only before it walked over a lip on the beach and I could not relocate. I tried walking on the roadway parallel to the bird to get closer but it appeared to have left when I got to the end. Another birder followed shortly after and saw no shorebirds. I let another birder know and he checked later in the morning and also saw no plovers. Someone looked again after 6:30 p.m. and could not relocate it. The first photo is an extreme closeup from the original photo and the second is slightly less cropped to provide more background. Here’s what I saw at the time and see in the photo. A plover that was a little paler than the Semipalmated around the park. Slightly longer legs. Legs appeared grey in the field and do so in the photo as well. Until I noticed the grey legs I thought it might be a Piping. I questioned that out in the field because of the leg colour, large smudge on the cheek and the size of the black bill. My view and even my camera image were so small however I did not want to make a call until I could look at the photo on a computer screen (which couldn't happen until around 5). Having done so It is a Snowy Plover. Note the all-black bill. No band across the chest, not a strong one as with a Wilson's or even a pale broken one, as with a Semipalmated. There is a slight horizontal bar over the top of the wing as can be found on a Snowy. There is a substantial smudge behind the eye and that smudge is darker than the back of the bird and the cap. The forehead and top of the head were paler than Semipalmated. In the field it seemed there may be a slightly darker horizontal bar on the forehead, as with Snowy, but it is not obvious in the photo. From the photo I noticed that there are white edges to the feathers on the tail with black feathers in the middle at the bottom of the tail, also found with Snowy Plovers. General expert consensus is that this is an adult bird.

Technical information

Model

COOLPIX P900

ISO

140

Focal length

357 mm

Flash

Flash did not fire

f-stop

f/6.5

Shutter speed

1/500 sec

Dimensions

1070 pixels x 785 pixels

Original file size

297.67 KB