birds
grrlscientist | February 16, 2009tags: Chestnut-sided Warbler, Dendroica pensylvanica, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Chestnut-sided Warbler, Dendroica pensylvanica, photographed at the Boyce Thompson Arboretum, Arizona. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Richard Ditch, 4 January 2009 [larger view].
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
As an added bonus, can you identify the insect in this bird's beak?
Chestnut-sided Warbler, Dendroica pensylvanica, photographed at the Boyce Thompson Arboretum, Arizona.
Image: Richard Ditch, 4 January 2009 [larger…
grrlscientist | February 15, 2009tags: Leucistic Song Sparrow, Melospiza melodia, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Leucistic Song Sparrow, Melospiza melodia, photographed at the far end of the Nisqually River, Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge, near Olympia, Washington State. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Dan Streiffert, 25 January 2009 [larger view].
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
NOTE: If you have seen this bird or images of it, please don't "spill the beans" for everyone else who hasn't yet seen it!
grrlscientist | February 14, 2009tags: Costa's Hummingbird, Calypte costae, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Costa's Hummingbird, Calypte costae, photographed in Arizona. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Richard Ditch, 23 December 2004 [larger view].
Date Time Original: 2004:12:23 16:04:23
Exposure Time: 1/60
F-Number: 8.00
ISO: 640
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
grrlscientist | February 13, 2009tags: Ross's Gull, Rhodostethia rosea, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Ross's Gull, Rhodostethia rosea, photographed near the Tuttle Creek Reservoir outflow tubes in Kansas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow].
Image: Dave Rintoul, 14 January 2009 [larger view].
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
In alternate plumage, the pinkish cast to the plumage and black ring around the head are diagnostic. In basic plumage, the evenly gray wings on both the upper and under surfaces and the wedge-shaped tail (which isn't easily seen in…
edyong | February 13, 2009In the summer of 2007, thirty-four travellers left home with backpacks in tow to see the world. But these weren't human students, out to get drunk and pretentious find themselves in foreign lands - they were small songbirds, migrating to tropical climates for the winter.
Their backpacks were light-measuring devices called "geolocators", each about the size of a small coin. By measuring rising and falling light levels, these miniature contraptions revealed the timings of sunrise and sunset wherever the birds happened to be flying. Those, in turn, revealed where they were in the world, and…
grrlscientist | February 12, 2009tags: mystery bird, identify this bird, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Probable hybrid hummingbird, Violet-crowned x Broad-billed hummingbird, Amazilia violiceps x Cynanthus latirostris, photographed in the Boyce Thompson Arboretum, Arizona. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Richard Ditch, 18 December 2007 [larger view].
Date Time Original: 2004:12:23 16:04:23
Exposure Time: 1/60
F-Number: 8.00
ISO: 640
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
NOTE: If you are one of those peeps who…
gregladen | February 11, 2009Everyone knows about Darwin's Finches, of the Galapagos Islands. But of course, Darwin made observations of birds throughout his travels on The Beagle. Here, I present a number of passages from The Voyage that include some of these observations.
Struthio Rhea
I will now give an account of ... the Struthio Rhea, or South American ostrich. This bird is well known to abound over the plains of Northern Patagonia, and the united provinces of La Plata. It has not crossed the Cordillera; but I have seen it within the first range of mountains on the Uspallata plain.... The ordinary habits of the…
grrlscientist | February 11, 2009tags: Greater Sage-Grouse, Centrocercus urophasianus, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
Here is a feather pic from a [Mystery bird] Male Greater Sage-Grouse, Centrocercus urophasianus, for the mystery bird quiz, along with a map (below the fold) from Google Earth showing where it was collected (East Canyon Road SW of Henefer, Utah, 40.95N, 111.55W, elevation 6200 ft or 1890 meters) [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Dave Rintoul, feather collected on 10 April 2005 [larger view].
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
East Canyon Road SW…
grrlscientist | February 10, 2009tags: mystery bird, identify this bird, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Pine Warbler, Dendroica pinus, photographed at Port Bolivar, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 13 January 2009 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope TSN-PZ camera TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/320s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
grrlscientist | February 9, 2009tags: Birds in the News, BirdNews, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter
Black-throated Sparrow, Amphispiza bilineata, in Chaco Canyon.
Image: Dave Rintoul, June 2008 [larger view].
Birds in Science
This is a link to a fascinating slide show that documents 9 links in the dinosaur-to-bird transition -- plenty of strong evidence that birds evolved from dinosaurs! GrrlScientist comment: "link" number four is very dubious, though, and I am surprised they even used it in their story.
People Hurting Birds
Both engines of the US Airways flight that crash-landed in the Hudson River last month…
grrlscientist | February 9, 2009tags: Western Meadowlark, Sturnella neglecta, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Western Meadowlark, Sturnella neglecta, photographed on the Attwater Prairie Chicken Refuge, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 12 June 2008 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/350s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso40.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
grrlscientist | February 8, 2009tags: Charles Darwin, nature, evolution, streaming video
This video "has stunned scientists around the world" (really?) as this bird thinks critically, just like a human, to catch fish. Give this bird a piece of bread and watch it use it as fish bait [1:17]
Okay, a special question for all my mystery birds fans: can you name this species? What field marks led you to this identification? Oh, and have any of you ever seen something like this?
grrlscientist | February 8, 2009tags: Birdbooker Report, bird books, animal books, natural history books, ecology books
"One cannot have too many good bird books"
--Ralph Hoffmann, Birds of the Pacific States (1927).
The Birdbooker Report is a special weekly report of a wide variety of science, nature and behavior books that currently are, or soon will be available for purchase. This report is written by one of my Seattle birding pals and book collector, Ian "Birdbooker" Paulsen, and is edited by me and published here for your information and enjoyment. Below the fold is this week's issue of The Birdbooker Report which…
grrlscientist | February 8, 2009tags: California Towhee, Pipilo crissalis, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] California Towhee, Pipilo crissalis, photographed in San Francisco, California. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Terry Sohl, 18 December 2008 [larger view].
Photo taken with Canon 50D, 400 5.6L lens.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
laelaps | February 8, 2009
Since so many people enjoyed yesterday's photo of a sandpiper poking around a Delaware beach at sunset, here are two more photos of sandpipers I took the same evening.
grrlscientist | February 7, 2009tags: Nelson's Sharp-Tailed Sparrow, Ammodramus nelsoni, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Nelson's Sharp-Tailed Sparrow, Ammodramus nelsoni, photographed while demonstrating its unusual perching technique at Crab Street, Surfside, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 18 November 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.
Review all mystery birds to date.
laelaps | February 7, 2009
A sandpiper, photographed at Prime Hook National Wildlife Refuge, Delaware.
grrlscientist | February 6, 2009tags: mystery bird, identify this bird, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Plain Chachalaca, Ortalis vetula, photographed in Santa Ana Wildlife Refuge, Texas. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Joseph Kennedy, 4 April 2008 [larger view].
Nikon D200, Kowa 883 telescope TSN-PZ camera eyepiece 1/250s f/8.0 at 1000.0mm iso400.
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
grrlscientist | February 5, 2009tags: Brewer's Sparrow, Spizella breweri, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Probable Brewer's Sparrow, Spizella breweri, photographed in the brush in Lake County, near Madison, South Dakota (this bird was severely out of its normal range). [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Terry Sohl, 30 September 2006 [larger view].
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Review all mystery birds to date.
grrlscientist | February 4, 2009tags: Varied Thrush, Ixoreus naevius, birds, mystery bird, bird ID quiz
[Mystery bird] Varied Thrush, Ixoreus naevius, photographed in central Ontario. The bird died after striking the window of lakeside cottage fringed with Eastern Hemlock, Red Oak, Winterberry and American Bittersweet. [I will identify this bird for you tomorrow]
Image: Michael Butler, 16 November 2008. [larger view].
Please name at least one field mark that supports your identification.
Original blog entry about this bird.
Review all mystery birds to date.