ML615669743
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Observation details
****RARE**** Seen at low tide near sea wall in front of town north east side of Beach. This was the only corvid we came across during our 3 day visit to Con Dao. Large-billed Crow and House Crow were the 2 vaguely possible species we were aware of, this bird did not fit either of them (Bill size/shape, and plumage color). We thought it might be a Carrion Crow at first, because they are an occasional vagrant in Vietnam, but the bill seems too angular, too straight from culmen to tip of bill. Also, read that carrion crows have greenish sheen, our bird was maybe slightly purple/bronze sheen? The wings (coverts, secondaries and primaries) show an even brown hue of a juvenile bird. We reviewed photos of Juv Rook online and it seems to work, as they hold on to their nasal bristles through the first winter, and the upper mandible is angular and thin as with our bird. We did consider the possibility of an aberrant bill, say of a large-billed, but it doesn't seem malformed? Other ID points mentioned were the shaggy trousers (loose feathers on belly). There was a record of Rook in Thailand, a few years back, but deemed a released bird? Not sure what that means for this sighting? Also we got a bad recording of a call, which matched a rattle type call from a rook, we will get that up when we can. We submitted this record to Bird Forum.net as well as expert friends and got several reaffirming replies discussing the aforementioned ID points. This would be a Vietnam first record I believe. We await the ebird review process and record committee's response.
Technical information
- Recorder
- Microphone
- Accessories
- Original file size
- 6.32 KB