From south-bay-birds-bounces+south-bay-birds-archive=[[email protected]] Tue Sep 30 11:10:29 2003 Received: from www.plaidworks.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by plaidworks.com (8.12.9/8.12.9) with ESMTP id h8UI7KIC012663 for <[[email protected]]>; Tue, 30 Sep 2003 11:07:21 -0700 (PDT) Received: from rtjones.nas.nasa.gov (rtjones.nas.nasa.gov [129.99.19.30]) by plaidworks.com (8.12.9/8.12.9) with ESMTP id h8UI5iZP012612 for <[[email protected]]>; Tue, 30 Sep 2003 11:05:44 -0700 (PDT) Received: from rtjones.nas.nasa.gov (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by rtjones.nas.nasa.gov (SGI-8.12.5/8.12.5/NAS-6n) with ESMTP id h8UI5hhv105552 for <[[email protected]]>; Tue, 30 Sep 2003 11:05:43 -0700 (PDT) Received: (from mrogers@localhost) by rtjones.nas.nasa.gov (SGI-8.12.5/8.12.5/Submit) id h8UI5hQ8105309 for [[email protected]]; Tue, 30 Sep 2003 11:05:43 -0700 (PDT) Date: Tue, 30 Sep 2003 11:05:43 -0700 (PDT) From: "Dr. Michael M. Rogers" <[[email protected]]> Message-Id: <[[email protected]]> To: [[email protected]] Subject: [SBB] Indeed an adult Pacific Golden-Plover X-BeenThere: [[email protected]] X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.2+ Precedence: list List-Id: South Bay Birding List-Unsubscribe: , List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Sender: south-bay-birds-bounces+south-bay-birds-archive=[[email protected]] Errors-To: south-bay-birds-bounces+south-bay-birds-archive=[[email protected]] All, Realizing that lunchtime viewing of the adult golden-plover was not going to provide adequate views, I decided to head out there first thing this morning 9/30/03. I finally got outstanding close views of this bird, being able to study it for over an hour with the sun directly behind me and no heat haze. I am now convinced that Al Jaramillo is indeed correct and that this bird is a very long-winged adult PACIFIC GOLDEN-PLOVER. For the first 40 minutes of my observation the bird gave me outstanding views (including preening and spread wing) of its left side, but only two short glimpses of the right side, which is the side with the retained long tertial and therefore crucial to the identification of this bird. The left side clearly had four primary tips extending past the one remaining (upper) tertial. It is possible that more primary tips could extend past this feather in general, but the fifth, sixth, and possibly seventh primaries (counting inward) have been dropped on this side. This makes the entire base of the fourth primary visible (including a white feather shaft) down to the greater coverts. When the bird fanned this wing it appeared that there were about three recently replaced inner primaries, the blacker tip of the outermost just poking out past the greater coverts on occasion. The two outermost primaries were very similar in length, with the spacing between the other outer primaries being much greater (about one eye width between the tips of p2 and p3 and the tips of p3 and p4 - counting inward). The tail ended between p3 and p4, just slightly beyond the tip of p4. The tip of the one remaining tertial ended before the tip of p4, but not by that much. I finally got good extended views of the right side of the bird when it started foraging. Five outer primaries were present, but it appeared that the sixth had been dropped. The longest tertial and one tertial above it were present. Only three primary tips extended past this longest tertial, with the outermost two being close to the same length, as on the left side of the bird. This is diagnostic for PACIFIC GOLDEN-PLOVER. At times the long tertial was drooped and the tip of the fourth primary could be seen. It appeared that the long tertial would just cover the fourth primary tip by a small amount, perhaps about equal to the width of its pale fringing. This is exactly the same wing tip formula that was present on the juvenile PACIFIC GOLDEN-PLOVER seen last week. As on the left side of the bird the tail tip fell between the tips of p3 and p4 or, equivalently, between the tips of p3 and the longest tertial. One might wonder how this bird could show the same number of primaries past the tertials as last week's juvenile bird, yet have a wing tip that extends so much further past the tail tip. The answer lies in the incredibly long tertials of this species. The longest tertial extends very nearly to the tail tip, a mark that is probably diagnostic for PACIFIC GOLDEN-PLOVER by itself. In fact it is quite possible that the length of the longest tertial (well shown in Tom's photo at http://www.geocities.com/tgrey41/GoldenPlover4.jpg) is outside the range achieved by the American Golden-Plover. The bird uttered a fairly quiet "tur-loo" as it flew to a nearby island, probably not diagnostic of either species. Thanks for making us study this bird some more Al - and thanks to Roland, who reported essentially the same wing tip description as noted above way back on 9/22/03. The only other birds of note were 2 AMERICAN PIPITS and 9+ LESSER YELLOWLEGS. Mike Rogers _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. south-bay-birds mailing list ([[email protected]]) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://www.plaidworks.com/mailman/options/south-bay-birds/south-bay-birds-archive%40plaidworks.com This email sent to [[email protected]]