ML451211051

观察细节

Rare but probably underdetected stopover migrant in NYC - as I tell people, “most of the population has to fly through the city to get to its breeding grounds.” Immediately noticed that this tame catharus was on the red side, and nearly its entire bottom mandible was yellow - the field marks they tell you to look out for. I stayed with it for 20 minutes and despite it coming to my feet to feed, it refused to sing. I alerted the other bicknell’s searchers (Josh and Max) but I don’t think it sang for them either, so we left the day with the bird as a BITH/GCTH. However, the next day Eleanor Ray and Matt Cook returned to the spot where a BITH was singing. I caught up with that bird too, which looked identical to this bird in terms of feather wear, coloring, and mandible - importantly, both birds seem to show pale wing bars. Later learned (h/t Alvaro Jaramillo) that wing bars is a feature typical of all 1y catharus, but this individual also has a pair of white spots on the back, pictured here and present on the following day’s bird. behavior of the two birds was identical, favoring the same patches of dirt to feed, and expressing the same level of unwariness. All told, I feel confident that they are the same individual. Link to the other checklist with more photos to compare plus recordings. https://ebird.org/checklist/S110837316