Quiz #473 (2012-4-05) Solution

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Solution by William von Herff and Tony Leukering

William von Herff provided a good solution, so I'll start with that.

"Well, here we have a bird clinging parallel to the trunk of a tree. We can see the tail, therefore we can assume that the bird is facing up. The only two families of ABA-area birds that cling vertically to trees are the creepers and woodpeckers. Brown creeper can be eliminated because it has a mottled brownish back, while this bird has a distinctly unpatterned black back, so it is a woodpecker. Now, it's time to start dissecting the field marks!

"First of all, the underside of this bird is mostly off-white. That eliminates most ABA-area woodpeckers; in fact, all except Red-headed, Golden-fronted, Red-bellied, Gila, Hairy, and Downy. Now, there is the black back with a big patch of white. The "solid black" part eliminates all of the options except Red-headed. But does that match up with the white patch? Well, Red-headed has a big white patch on the secondaries, so that matches."

Thanks, William. I will just add a few confirmatory points and discuss the bird's age. This quiz photo is an excellent illustration of the importance of using as many features in a bird's ID as one can manage. While sapsuckers also sport large white wing patches, they do not have mostly whitish underparts. As noted by William, the large white wing patch is composed of secondaries; the white wing patches on other woodpeckers are of different placement: those of sapsuckers are composed of secondary coverts, while those of the 'Centurus' ladder-backed species and Acorn and White-headed woodpeckers are composed of primary coverts and/or bases of primaries. Also, looking closely at the near edge of this white patch, we can discern two short, parallel black bars (indicated by arrows on inset, below), which is all we need to determine the bird's age as a first-cycle bird. Those faint bars on the bird's side adjacent to the white wing patch provides a feature confirming the bird's age.

I have also provided, below, the picture that I took of this individual before the one used as the quiz photo at Cox Hall Creek Wildlife Management Area, Cape May Co., NJ, on 8 January 2012. Note that those black bars in the wing patch are longer with the wing open. Also note, and this is very important when dealing with wing features, how the placement and shape of the white patch change from open wing to closed.

Incorrect species provided as answers:
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker - 3
Williamson's Sapsucker - 1

Congratulations to the 16 of 20 getting the quiz correct:
Tyler Bell
Bryan Guarente
Joshua Little
Ben Coulter
Kirk Huffstater
Robert McNab
Richard Jeffers
Gary Koehn
Donald Jones
William von Herff
Logan Kahle
Patty McKelvey
Su Snyder
Margie Joy
Casey Ryan
Joe Bens

Answer: Red-headed Woodpecker

Quiz #472 (2012-4-04) Solution

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Solution by Tony Leukering

[I apologize for the tardiness in getting the recent solutions posted, but I am currently catching up with a lot of writing projects after my return from Texas.]

Our backlit shorebird this week shows fairly strong contrast between white belly and brownish chest and a medium-length, perhaps droop-tipped, bill. These features may point some toward Pectoral Sandpiper. Unfortunately, anyone stopping analysis of the picture there would go astray, as the dark underwings and distinct black-and-white tail pattern certainly rule out that species. Yes, the underwings are actually dark; the underparts are shaded just as are the underparts and the white belly shows obvious and strong contrast with the dark
wings. Those features also rule out similar species, such as Sharp-tailed Sandpiper and Ruff. In fact, the dark underwings, alone, reduce our options to less than a handful: the two tattlers and Solitary and Wood sandpipers. The distinct tail pattern removes all but one of those.

I took this picture of a juvenile Solitary Sandpiper at Cape May Point S. P., Cape May Co., NJ, on 9 September 2011.

Incorrect species provided as answers:
Pectoral Sandpiper - 2
Wilson's Storm-Petrel - 1
Ruff - 2

Congratulations to the 15 of 20 respondents getting the quiz correct:
Margaret Smith
Donald Jones
Peter Wilkinson
Joshua Little
Ben Coulter
Tyler Bell
Pam Myers
Nathaniel Behl
Casey Ryan
Nick Komar
Robert McNab
Sean Walters
Margie Joy
Bryan Guarente
Richard Jeffers

Answer: Solitary Sandpiper