tags: American Coot, Fulica americana, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] American Coot, Fulica americana, photographed in [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 2 April 2008 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/800s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Rick Wright, author of Aimophila Adventures and Managing Director of WINGS Birding Tours Worldwide, writes:
Lobed feet are rare in birds. The foot in question is too long, too green, and too strong for any grebe, and too stout for a phalarope. The green color, with just a hint of red above the "ankle," points towards the coots, a possibility nicely confirmed by the slaty body plumage barely visible at the top of the tibia.
But which coot? I think the green of the tarsus may be too bright for Eurasian Coot, but don't know whether American Coot is alone in having such colorful gams.
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Grebe? The incompletely apoptosed interdigital webbing looks familiar.
Classic Coot feet.
I thought coot straight away too - "incompletely apoptosed interdigital webbing" wasn't quite the way I would put it. Plus the body is black.
I have no idea if it occurs in the US, but then I don't know if the photo was taken over there. It's not the UK, though. Too sunny.
Definitely a coot.
No way. Too much color for a coot. It's a common moorhen. They also have black on their bodies, but the small patch of pink above the ankle is a give away. Also, coots can have greenish legs, but to my knowledge, they are uniformly colored. This leg blends from green to yellow to pink.
It's a coot, as gallinules/moorhens don't have lobed toes.
Out on land those toes look rather reptilian, don't they?
Lobed toes mean either a grebe or a coot. Based on the yellow leg color and the bit of black plumage, I'd say American Coot.