BS: Bird identification question

Subject: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 17 Sep 12 - 03:25 AM

Do western meadowlarks ever have a cream-colored speckled breast? Or is there another bird about the same size, with a medium-long pointy beak, that hangs out in the Pacific NW of the US?

There was a bird like this in the tree above me in Portland, Oregon, today, and I could see it mostly from underneath and a little from the side.   It was about the size of a robin - maybe slightly larger - definitely with a spotted/speckled pale yellow or cream-colored breast and a beak much like the western meadowlark's or maybe slightly longer - and I'm pretty sure the back and head were not brightly colored either, though I could not see the back very well. I'd say the head was sort of brown and speckled too.

Anyone have a clue what bird this might have been? It was quite pretty, though not at all flashy.

Genie

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 17 Sep 12 - 03:29 AM

BTW, here's a pic of a western meadowlark (tail not shown) and this looks a lot like my bird except the breast is not spotted.

Another western meadowlark image

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Dead Horse
Date: 17 Sep 12 - 08:40 AM

I had a very peculiar Peking Duck at my local chinese restaurant the other day. I cant describe it but I can send you the bill :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: maeve
Date: 17 Sep 12 - 11:07 AM

Genie, did your bird have the speckles as well as the v-shaped band?

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Bettynh
Date: 17 Sep 12 - 12:44 PM

This site describes immature meadowlarks as "similar to winter adult, but duller face pattern, paler yellow below, and breast streaked in a V, not solid." Could this be your bird?

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: gnu
Date: 17 Sep 12 - 05:37 PM

Dead Horse.... well done!

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 17 Sep 12 - 09:31 PM

Thanks, Betty.

I'm still not sure that's my bird, because I was seeing it from below, so I couldn't see its back. It appeared to be a little more 'streamlined' in shape (body a bit elongated, head smaller in comparison to body and neck a bit longer) than those drawings.    But that could well be the bird I saw.

Maybe I can see it again if it tends to hang out in that same tree a lot.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Arkie
Date: 17 Sep 12 - 09:40 PM

The immature birds of several varieties including Robins, Bluebirds, and others have more spots than adults. Here is an immature Meadowlark.

Meadowlark

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 07:17 AM

I don't know why there's a problem with bird identification.

French photographers identified a pair of Little Tits at 500 yards!

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Dead Horse
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 11:43 AM

You are not taking this seriously are you Nigel.
Naughty boy.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 12:15 PM

It might help to go by a process of elimination first. For instance, Genie, the bird you are describing is definitely not a Ream-Nosed Romflombeler. Nor is it a Tippling's Twaddler, a Maleficent Gulch, a Parsimonious Nuthatch or a Least Western Glebe. Though it does appear to have some features in common with the Peckerson's Glebe, that bird's range would not likely place it in Portland, Oregon at this season, so I think we can cross the PG off the list too.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 05:14 PM

Genie, I have seen meadowlarks many times, and I don't believe I've seen one in a tree. On a fencepost yes, in a field, yes, but never in a tree. Meadowlarks like to stay low and be in open country.

Do you live in a densely forested area, so that there was nowhere for the bird to rest except in a tree?

If you don't, I suspect the bird was something else - a migrant of some kind. Keep looking because it might be something new and wonderful.

I'm just back from California, where we saw avocets, stilts and a curlew - all new and wonderful for us.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 09:27 PM

Hawk, you are so astute and full of benificience. (But I hear there's a salve that can help.)


leeneia, this bird was perched in a tree in the parking lot of a church in Portland (adjacent to a city park with many evergreen trees).    There were no fields or meadows nearby.

It seemed to be sort of dove-shaped, rather slender. I don't recall how long the tail was, but I don't think it was really short.

I'll see if I can find a bird picture that looks something like it, in shape anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 09:59 PM

I'm thinking the bird may have been a woodpecker, though it wasn't pecking while I was watching it.   The beak looked sort of like a woodpecker beak. And I'm not sure, but I think it had a bit of red on its head (though I didn't get much of a look at the top of the head, viewing it from below).

So far, I'd say it looked a lot like this
Red Shafted Flicker Woodpecker IF it had the red on the head. That is definitely what the breast looked like and the side of the wings.   It seemed to be a bit more slender and elongated in shape, with the head a bit smaller, but that may have been due to the bird's posture and the angle of view.
This woodpecker looks more like the shape, but I don't recall any red on the under side of the tail, nor do I specifically recall the dark feathers at the top of the breast.

It could also have been a pileated woodpecker but it wasn't as drab as the birds pictured here.   

The shape of the bird looked more like this , at least re the proportions of the head and body, than like most of the pictures of woodpeckers I've found, but again, I was mostly seeing the bird from below or sort of from the side and below.

I'm inclined to say it was a red-shafted flicker woodpecker or at least something very similar to it. Anyway it was a gorgeous bird!

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 10:03 PM

Oops!   Apparently that pic I linked to that was supposed to be a pileated woodpecker was not one.   
My bird looked something like that pic, though.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 10:12 PM

This red-shafted flicker definitely has the shape and the speckled breast of the bird I was watching from below.   I just don't remember that much red being on the head, nor do I recall the black at the top of the breast.

But in some pics, like this one, the red on the head and the black on the breast are not as striking.   I"m pretty sure this is the bird I was watching.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 10:37 PM

That sounds like a good guess. A flicker would be more likely 1) in a tree and 2) in a town and around people.

good work!

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Sep 12 - 11:21 PM

Wow! Those are some pretty birds, Genie.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 12:48 AM

Yes, this bird was really beautiful. That's what prompted me to find out what it was.
Around here (Portland, OR), the only birds I usually see around my house are sparrows, jays, pigeons, crows, robins, seagulls and the occasional hummingbird. We do have ospreys, Canada geese, turkey buzzards, blue herons, golden and bald eagles, cormorants, puffins, and a few others in the region but we don't see them often in the city (away from the river).
I'd never seen a bird like this one in the city.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 12:50 AM

Leeneia, the bird identification sites I've found sometimes refer to this bird as a red-shafted flicker woodpecker (or a yellow-shafted one, but they're supposed to be eastern) and sometimes just as a red-shafted (or yellow-shafted) flicker.    Is there a definite difference between a flicker and a woodpecker, or are flickers a sub-category of woodpeckers?

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 01:16 AM

I'm still not sure exactly which sub-species of flicker this was. per this site.

"Northern Flickers are large, brown woodpeckers with a gentle expression and handsome black-scalloped plumage. On walks, don't be surprised if you scare one up from the ground. It's not where you'd expect to find a woodpecker, but flickers eat mainly ants and beetles, digging for them with their unusual, slightly curved bill. When they fly you'll see a flash of color in the wings – yellow if you're in the East, red if you're in the West – and a bright white flash on the rump."

That flash of color in the wings was what first got my attention, as the bird flew into the tree above me and settled onto a branch. It was quite striking (mostly yellowish but with a bit of red, and the darker spots).

Apparently, the yellow shafted and red shafted flickers often interbreed, and sometimes both may with the gilded flicker.   That may explain why the coloring on the bird I saw was not exactly like the coloring of the photos I've found.

But I suspect the bird I saw may have been a female red shafted flicker.
red shafted flickers diagram.
She would not have had the bright red streak on her cheeks that the males have.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: raredance
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 01:32 AM

Genie, looks like you have done a good job of figuring this out. Flickers are woodpeckers, but the term "woodpecker" is rarely attached to their common name. During fall migration I have had as many as 20 flickers chowing down on the berries of my gray dogwood tree. They will strip the tree clean in about 2 days

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 05:10 AM

Thanks for the info, raredance.

I'm so glad that leeneia told me that meadowlarks aren't likely to be perched in a tree in the city. Otherwise I might not have kept looking, even though the meadowlark images didn't seem to be quite right.

I wonder if flickers might be interested in my mini-crab apple tree.   I also have a pretty large and productive volunteer bing cherry tree in my yard. The cherries look and taste just like the regular bings, but smaller and mostly pit. DK if that would bother flickers.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 10:15 AM

I don't suppose you could actually say that a flicker is a kind of woodpecker, but certainly they are closely related. No matter what a biologist would say, I tell beginners that a flicker is a woodpecker in a brown suit.

I haven't followed your link, Genie. Have you discovered the Cornell University bird site? It's wonderful.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 03:10 PM

Actually, I posted about 8 different links, leeneia, all of them with photos or drawings.   The last one (drawings) is the one that makes me think my bird was a female red-shafted flicker or close relative. I'll check out the Cornell site too. Thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 03:30 PM

It was fun following through this mystery even though I came late to it.

Something that's useful to have in mind when comparing the shape of a live bird to a photo or illustration: Ambient temperature affects how much they'll puff up their feathers to increase or decrease the R-value. So there in the real world there will be variations on the "standard" silhouette.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: GUEST,Crowhugger
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 03:31 PM

That last GUEST post was me!

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Sep 12 - 10:15 PM

An almost irrelevant bit of trivia appears in recent news bite:

Bolivian park declared one of most diverse places on Earth

"Madidi holds 1,088 bird species, 200 species of mammals, 300 types of fish and 12,000 plant varieties."

... and later in the article:

"Only 11 countries have more bird species than Madidi, and the entire United States contains less [sic] than 900 types of birds."

(If we've only got 900 kinds, I guess we should recognized them all?)

John

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 20 Sep 12 - 05:52 PM

That's interesting to know, John, but I won't be going. After my first and last trip to Costa Rica, I announced that I am not going anyplace where you can't drink the water.

Twenty years ago I might have been raring to go...

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Sep 12 - 01:34 AM

the flicker is indeed a full-fledged member of the woodpecker family (Picidae). if it was a flicker in portland, it was undoubtedly a red-shafted flicker -- they're year-round urban residents. as for the red on the head, the males have a red moustache-like patch, the females don't. from your description it sure sounds like a female red-shafted flicker -- looks like you came to the same conclusion. if you see it again, watch for it in flight: it should display a noticeable white patch in its rump. if you live in portland, a handy book to take a look at is Birds of the Willamette Valley Region by Harry Nehls, a local Audubon Society stalwart and all-around good guy.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: open mike
Date: 21 Sep 12 - 02:45 AM

i have seen some interesting birds here...
one which looks a lot like a robin...is a varied thrush.
it has sort of a "V" or bib...and sometimes spots...
any chance it might be this one?
http://www.birdweb.org/birdweb/bird/varied_thrush
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varied_Thrush
http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/varied_thrush/id
http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw/News/VariedThrush2005.htm
http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/birding/varied-thrush/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dlFXGfbcYvg

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 21 Sep 12 - 10:50 PM

Thanks for posting, open mike. I'd never even heard of a varied thrush before. It's a beautiful bird.

Subject: RE: BS: Bird identification question
From: Genie
Date: 22 Sep 12 - 04:53 AM

Thanks for the additional info, folks.

Crowhugger, yes, I did think probably one reason my bird's shape seemed different from many of the photos and diagrams was not just my angle of view (from below) but the 'posture' of the bird as it flew into the tree and settled into the branches.   It had its neck kind of stretched out at first, giving it that sort of sleek, slender look.

Here's pretty much what it looked like as it flew into the tree (except this is a male and I think the one I saw was a female): Red shafted flicker in flight

Open Mike, here are your URLS, blickified:
varied thrush
Varied thrush 2
varied thrush 3
varied thrush 4
varied thrush 5
varied thrush 6