Cooper's or Red-shouldered???

 I called it a Cooper's Hawk when I saw it today on our Grand Ronde Raptor Run. But now that I've seen the photo, I think it is a juvenile Red-shouldered Hawk because of the vertical streaks on upper breast and horizontal streaks on lower. But the tail banding has wide white bands and I thought they were narrow on RSHA? Also the wings look short compared to the tail (near as I can tell) which would make it an accipiter. Was I right in the first place? I am so confused!

photo cropped and lightened below...

Thanks to Hendrik Herlyn for this response: I think your initial impression was correct - this is an immature Cooper's Hawk. The tail is too long for Red-shouldered, which also doesn't have so many bars (and you are right, it would have narrower white bands). The underside looks too evenly streaked for a RSHA, and the head pattern and color is very typical for a young Cooper's.

And Wayne Hoffman for this: You were right the first time - Cooper's Hawk.  In addition to the characters you mentioned, the head is relatively small.  The underparts pattern does look sort of like a Red-shouldered with the bibbed chest look and paler belly, but is far paler (fewer streaks) them most young Red-shoulders.

Mountain and Snowy Plovers

Today Dawn V and I drove to South Beach State Park, just south of Newport, to look for the Mountain Plover that has been hanging around there for weeks with a flock of Snowy Plovers. We trained our binoculars up and down the beach and quickly saw a bevy of little shorebirds north of the trail from the parking area. We walked closer and there was our Mountain Plover, keeping company with a little flock of Snowy Plovers. Farther out toward the ocean were a few Sanderlings running up and down as they like to do, with a few Snowy Plovers trying to keep up with them. The Mountain Plover was much bigger than his Snowy friends. My photos were taken at a distance in light rain (so they're lousy... but numerous.)

Mountain Plover top, Snowy Plover bottom in both  these photos

Mtn. Plover center, Snowies right and left

Snowy Plover

Snowy Plover

Sanderling left, 3 Snowies right

Mountain Plover

Mountain Plover

Mtn. Plover

Mtn. Plover

Mtn. Plover

Raptor Route Mystery Hawks

Update:

Lessons I have learned:

from OBOL birders...

1) If it has a red tail, it is a Red-tailed Hawk, unless it's a Kestrel which this first bird clearly is not, having no face mask. Even though it looked small to me, the red tail means it's a Red-tail. Maybe it was a little male.

2) If it is obviously a big hawk (like the 2nd bird) on top of a tree, it is a Red-tailed Hawk until proven otherwise. They can be very light in front (like the 2nd bird).

Other lessons I have learned: 

1) Size and distance can be very difficult to judge.

2) Do not assume the raptor that flew out of sight is the same one you see a little later from a different angle.

3) On a raptor route, if you don't know what it is, try to take a quick snapshot and then continue. Do not agonize over birds that are too far away or too hidden in shrubbery to be easily identified. It will make you rush through the rest of your route and possibly miss raptors.

4) After running this route every winter since January of 2005, I am still learning new stuff.

Now here is my original plea:

Help, please! Usually, I can identify the raptors we see on my Grand Ronde raptor route. Today, however, we saw a small hawk near the top of a deciduous tree along the South Yamhill River that I could never get a clear look at it because twigs were in the way. I had forgotten to bring my camera with the super zoom. Drat! Here is the hawk from the back, shooting into the sun. The tail (I think that's a tail) did appear reddish brown as in the photo... or at least something did.

 I walked up the road to take a photo with the sun at my back but could not get to where I could see the front of the bird. My first thought when I saw it from the back was Merlin. But the brown tail threw me. And the front has barring on the side, apparently, and is light. I've only seen dark Merlins here. Help!

 The bird flew while I was trying to get the scope on it. We drove on to Shenk Wetlands, across the South Yamhill River from the bird. We saw a bird in the top of a very distant fir that I thought might be the same bird. But now, looking at the photos, I don't think so. This bird appears much bigger than the first bird. Johnny took a photo of the bird's back through the scope. (He has a very dirty camera lens on his little camera.)

We then drove quickly back to the road, found the tree which was still a very long way from the road, and Johnny took more photos through the scope. Now it looks like a Red-tailed Hawk, sort of. But what's with the pale horizontal barring (hard to see in our photos but obvious in person).

Here are the photos I took with my camera.

 Front view, unlightened...

 Please click on the photos to bring them up big. Sorry they are so terrible. I am feeling really dumb about these ids. I have pored through my Wheeler book, Raptors of Western North America, but cannot figure out the small raptor. As for the other hawk (at least I think it is a different bird), I guess Red-tails can come in a multitude of designs so unless someone has a better idea...

Just to show I can tell what a bird is when it's obvious, here is one of the 3 Red-shouldered Hawks we saw on the route today... very far away.

And a Bald Eagle, even farther away.

 I love adult Red-shouldered Hawks and Bald Eagles. I can tell what they are at any distance.

Which Carpodacus Finch? Er, that is, Haemorhous Finch

We have mostly Purple Finches here, so when I saw this finch with streaked flanks, I assumed it was a House Finch. I took photos through my dirty upstairs office window (no birds ever fly into *this* window!). After looking at the photos, I decided it had too much color on the back and maybe was a Purple Finch after all. But those streaky sides bothered me. And it looked like it had a peaked crown and not enough color... and pink rather than the raspberry of a Purple Finch. Could it be a Cassin's? Help!

Update: the wonderful folks on Oregon Birds Online offered great advice. First, Dave Irons let me know that my Carpodacus finches are now Haemorhous finches.  He also said: "note that the bird has rather white and unstreaked undertail coverts. House Finches have dingier undertail coverts that are streaked in all plumages." That's another thing I didn't know (or find in my bird books.) Plus, Purple Finch "males of the western subspecies H. p. californicus can show a fair amount of streaking on the flanks." Ah ha!

Joel Geier, who has better eyes than I, said:

"The broad brownish cheek stripe showing through the reddish color on the
head narrows this down to either a Purple Finch or a Cassin's Finch, and
the curved culmen makes it a Purple Finch ..."

I can tell females apart by that head pattern, but sure couldn't see it on this bird. And the culmen looks straight in some of my photos and curved in others. Sigh. 

Very helpful hints came from Judy Meredith, who has told me before (but I always seem to forget) that: "Often the case with ID is perplexing but I tend to use a collection of field marks and look for "most like" versus completely positive of ID." Here is her collection of field marks to separate Cassin's from Purple: 

Undertail streaked in Cassin's, plain white in Purple.
Steaks on flanks crisp on Cassin's and blurred on Purple
Upper bill, culmen, is totally uncurved in Cassin's and has a slight curve in Purple. The Cassin's is as if you put two rulers together to form a triangle. No curve at all.
Back of bird in Cassin's usually has restricted coloring and Purple has wash which goes farther down along the back of the bird.
Chest in center and sides is white in Cassin's and in Purple it is a dingy white, not bright between steaks or central breast area.
  

Below are the photos lightened from the "photo fix" setting of my photo program. Thanks to all for the help!  I now know this is a western subspecies (streaked flanks) of Purple Finch.

The wonderful folks on OBOL continue to add insights...


Wayne Hoffman provided the reason for the name change:

"...There are some pinkish Eurasian finches (rosefinches) that look sort of
like our 3, and they were named Carpodacus.   Subsequently, taxonomists
noted the similarity of ours to those and put them in the same genus.
 Now, DNA analyses have shown that they are not close relatives, but
instead the resemblance is convergence.  The evidence says that the
Asian rosefinches are more closely related to Bullfinches, Canaries,
Goldfinches, and Siskins than they are to Cassin's, Purple, and House
finches.  Thus, they do not belong in the same genus, and because the
Rosefinches got the name Carpodacus first, they get to keep it..

Now, according to the rules of priority (older names have priority over
newer ones) the next oldest name that was ever used for any of the
American 3 was Haemorhous, so that is what we get."

Pamela Johnstone explained bird colors from an artist's point of view...
 
" In my mind there are dyed and painted birds. The analogy has nothing to do with real birds. Male American Goldfinches are painted. Birds with a more transparent coloring like the Haemorus are dyed, because the brown shows through the red, which was applied with dye or watercolor after the brown was laid on."

Pam also noted that both House and Purple finches can come in many red/orange/yellow shades depending,  on diet. "Both have color deficiencies when they don’t get enough carotenoids in their diet... Females don’t change, since it’s only the red that depends on carotenoids."

"Females are easier to i.d than males because the colors don’t vary and the brown markings show their difference. The brown streak that people talk about on a PUFI’s face shows up really well on them. I think of it as a thumbprint, which means that it’s fairly broad, not like a line through the eye. It looks as if someone set their thumb with the nail toward the bird’s bill and pressed a brown ink mark over its eye. The body streaks are easier to see, too."

 

"PUFI have a bigger base to the bill, that extends higher up the forehead. HOFI have a blunt little forehead above a dark beak, and PUFI have a continuous slope down the profile from forehead to beak tip."

 

Thanks, all!

Anna's Hummingbird... Farm Bird #151

Although Anna's Hummingbirds are common both summer and winter in areas east of us, we have never had one here that I've seen. But a few weeks ago, Johnny saw a hummer hovering outside the back door. I caught a glimpse of it perched on a weed before it flew off and disappeared. I quickly filled my long empty hummingbird feeders, since our Rufous hummers are only here in the summer. But nothing came to drink until today... Friday the 13th (always my lucky day).

I had put a feeder outside my milk room window so I could watch for hummers there. The other feeders are outside the kitchen window but I'm in the barn more often than in the kitchen. This morning while doing the morning milking, I caught a glimpse of a hummingbird feeding from that feeder. I had my camera with me so took photos through the milk room window.

Thanks to the several birders more knowledgeable than I about winter Anna's who, after viewing the photos, let me know that this is, indeed, an Anna's Hummingbird. Floyd Shrock said: "No doubt in my mind, Linda, that you have an Anna's there. I notice the greenish on the flanks and lower abdomen, and the beginnings of a dark gorget. I'm guessing it's an immature male..."

Click on the photo for larger images.

Ankeny National Wildlife Refuge

Dawn and I hoped to find the Ruff today (a shorebird that has been seen at Ankeny recently), but we did not. We saw lots of shorebirds, most of which I could not identify. When someone tells me what they are, I'll caption them.

I could identify the peregrine falcon that sat high in a dead tree, keeping watch over all.

                                                       It was a gray day, so I lightened it.

The Great Egrets were easy to recognize... we saw many.

After getting thoroughly chilled at the pull-out by the railroad tracks where the Ruff and its Yellowlegs companions had been seen, we drove to the boardwalk through trees where the wind was not so brutal. Eagle Eye Dawn spotted a Red-breasted Sapsucker along there. I had a hard time finding it in my viewfinder, then holding my heavy camera still for a photo, then getting a picture when the sapsucker's head wasn't hidden. All are a bit blurry. The clearest one has a branch through the bird's head.

We drove on to the Acorn Woodpecker site, where we found no woodpeckers, or anything else moving about in the cold wind and drizzle. So we went onward to the kiosk and there found a zillion birds, including a distant, lone, Greater White-fronted Goose. It was grazing as it walked and not often picking it's head up for a photo.

One Dowitcher was close enough for a reasonable photo... so I took lots of them, front, back and sideways.

I do not know what the rest of these shorebirds are. I await input from knowledgeable folks.

My guess is Western Sandpipers

My guess is Dunlin

Any id help would be appreciated.

Sad End for a Golden-crowned Kinglet

The mirrors in my riding arena are covered with tarps and sheets except when I am riding in there. California Quail seemed to like to knock themselves out on those mirrors hence the coverings. Our house windows are littered with decals that birds are supposed to be able to see, plus falcon silhouettes, and swaying-in-the-breeze colorful bird scarers. I had been pleased so far this migration season to have no birds killing themselves on our windows. Until yesterday, when this beautiful Golden-crowned Kinglet appeared lifeless in a pot outside the front door. So sad.

I could not bear to bury such a beautiful tiny creature, so I placed it in the chrysanthemum flowers.

RIP lovely wee bird.