ML557142561
Contributor
Date
Location
- Age
- Not specified
- Sex
- Not specified
Media notes
A perennially wintering Brown-crested Flycatcher photographed by Curtis A. Marantz on 12 April 2023 at the Chrisanta Drive riparian corridor in Mission Viejo, Orange County, California.
Observation details
I spotted this wintering bird moving about in the upper branches of a largely leafless tree on the south side of the trail from the road down toward the railroad tracks. I then saw this bird moving about this tree, and then a nearby tree, before it flew across the road and moved north along the road between the riparian corridor and the slope up to the yards to the east. The flycatcher moved from tree to tree, generally perching in the open and often not much above eye level along the road for maybe 100 meters before it flew across the road to the willows of the riparian corridor, along which it worked back south, and eventually it flew back across the road to the trees where I had initially seen it, and in which I lost track of it. I was unable to relocate the flycatcher during the rest of my visit. The flycatcher was silent while under observation, and I never heard it vocalize when it was not in view. I am not sure I ever saw this bird foraging, but it did move from tree to tree, possibly as I approached, but it was not overly wary and it permitted a relatively close approach. I saw this bird at heights between roughly two and six meters above the ground. This was a relatively large, slim flycatcher that was clearly larger than a Black Phoebe that I saw shortly later, but also slimmer and more elongate than a kingbird. The bill was notably long, in that it would have extended backward to the rear edge of the auriculars, if not even slightly further, but it was not as heavy as is often the case in this species. I also noted that the culmen was straight for almost its entire length before curving downward sharply to a weakly hooked tip. The forehead was quite steep and the crown had a somewhat ragged, dome-shaped appearance, behind which the back of the neck sloped steeply downward to the upper back. Typical of this genus, this bird’s head was proportionately large, its neck was relatively slim, and its body was slim, yet full-chested, and with a posture that was roughly diagonal with the tail held downward in the plane of the body. The wings were short, with a primary projection that was only a quarter to a fifth the length of the exposed primaries, and with the rounded wingtips having only about three primary tips visible beyond the longest secondaries. I further thought the wingtips reached right to the tips of the tapered undertail-coverts. The tail was approximately as long as the head, neck, and body combined, and it flared weakly from a slim base to a subtly double-rounded tip that had rounded corners, but only a weak notch in the center. I cannot now recall anything about the legs or feet, but I suspect they will be shown in my photos. This bird’s plumage patterns and coloration were typical of the genus, but the colors were only moderately bright. The forehead and crown were dark brown, and contrasting only subtly with more grayish lores and auriculars, which themselves blended into the light gray color that characterized the throat, breast, and sides. I further noted that the gray of the breast and sides blended into a relatively pale, lemon-yellow that extended down through the lower breast, belly, flanks, and undertail coverts. I did not see the underside of the tail overly well, but it is possible that it may be shown in my photos. The dark brown crown did not contrast conspicuously with the back and sides of the neck, but I failed to note specifically in the field their coloration. The back and rump were sandy-brown, possibly with just a hint of olive, but no internal markings; however, the uppertail coverts did contrast as more rufescent, and blending into the color of the rump. The upperside of the closed tail was dark brown with narrow fringes of paler buff that created a somewhat striped pattern that was a bit diffuse. I only briefly saw rufous in the tail when the bird banked at one point, so I was unable to clearly see the pattern. The wings contrasted dark brown centers with paler fringes. On the greater and median coverts, the pale buff to olive-buff fringes were more apparent as tips than edges, which resulted in the appearance to two moderately conspicuous wingbars, but also with a row of narrow stripes between the wingbars. I also thought I detected at least some suggestion of an upper wingbar across the tips of the lower row of lesser coverts just below the scapulars. Contrasting somewhat with the rest of the wing was a small wedge of darker brown in the primary coverts that seemed to be just a bit darker distally at the tips of the feathers. The remiges were similarly brown internally, but with creamy-whitish fringes that were relatively narrow, but well-defined. The whitish edge on the longest tertial was narrow and of comparable width from the base to the tip. On the remaining secondaries, the edges were narrower, but still cream-colored to pale yellowish throughout this tract, producing a series of fine stripes. Contrasting sharply with the cream-colored fringes on the secondaries were the bright rufous edges to the primaries. The exposed primary tips were dark brown, and with at most narrow and inconspicuous fringes of pale buff that facilitated my differentiating the various feathers. I thought the bill was entirely black, but I could easily have missed some paler coloration at the base. The eyes were certainly dark, but I was unable to discern their precise color in the field, and as noted above, I have no recollection whatsoever of the color of the legs or feet.
Technical information
- Model
- ILCE-7RM5
- Lens
- FE 200-600mm F5.6-6.3 G OSS
- ISO
- 800
- Focal length
- 600 mm
- Flash
- Flash did not fire
- f-stop
- f/6.3
- Shutter speed
- 1/800 sec
- Dimensions
- 4692 pixels x 2833 pixels
- Original file size
- 10.56 MB