SNOWY EGRETS (Egretta thula) are small white herons of the Americas, similar to the European Little Egret. The first thing you may notice about them is that they have remarkable bright yellow feet. This distinguishes these birds from all other egret and heron species.
Young Snowy Egrets often have yellow markings higher up on their legs.
The feet are so bright that they are often visible underwater.
Snowy Egrets eat fish, crustaceans, insects and small reptiles. They have 3 main foraging tactics: (1) Standing still in or on the edge of water to ambush prey (2) Stalking prey in shallow water, often running or shuffling their feet to flush out prey (3) “Dip-fishing” by flying low over water.
In breeding season, Snowy Egrets grow beautiful plumes – “bridal plumage”. At one time these were in great demand as adornments for women’s hats (as with flamingos, parrots and many other decorative species). This reduced the population of the birds to dangerously low levels, from which they have now recovered. Their IUCN rating is now ‘Least Concern’.
Contemplating the next meal… one of Sandy Walker’s excellent Abaco photos taken this winterPhoto Credits: Sandy Walker, Woody Bracey, Tony Hepburn, Wiki
Mostly, the Cuban Emeralds at Delphi spend their days perching briefly on twigs before zooming like tiny green rockets to their next appointment – an inviting sugar-water feeder, a promising flower or maybe yet another tempting twig. Sometimes, pairs will put on an acrobatic mid-air display, flitting around each other at high speed, chittering, before disappearing into the coppice together. Avian speed-dating. Occasionally, they are more contemplative. Emeralds may be quite hard to spot in amongst the green leaves, but often they are there, quietly watching you go by. Here is one that stayed put when I stopped to admire it.
I’m keeping an eye on you…
I’ll tuck my wing in neatly if you are going to take pics of me
Uh-oh! Close-ups. This is my better side.
That’s enough, human. I’ve stopped the posing. Now push off and leave me alone.
In close-up, the feathers look like tiny iridescent pine needle fans
‘CHECK OUT THE WEB’: SEMIPALMATED PLOVERS ON ABACO
“Semipalmated”. You what? Come again? Ehhhh? My reactions to the word until embarrassingly recently. In fact until the steep learning curve involved in writing a bird book made some all of the terminology clearer. Plovers and sandpipers both have semipalmated versions, and I’ll take the semipalmated plover (Charadrius semipalmatus) first.
WHAT SHOULD I LOOK FOR?
A small shorebird with a grey-brown back and wings, a white underside with a single black neck band, and orange legs. They have a brown cap, a white forehead, a black eye mask and a short black bill with an orange base to it. And feet to be discussed below.
WHERE DO THEY LIVE?
Their summer home and breeding habitat is on the beaches and flats of northern Canada and Alaska. They nest in scrapes on the ground right out in the open. In the Autumn these little birds set off on long journeys south to warmer climes until Spring: the coasts of the southern states, Caribbean and South America. On Abaco, they are fairly common in certain areas including the beach at Delphi. Like other plovers, these birds are gregarious and will mix in with other shorebirds – which can make them hard to pick out in the crowd.
GET ON WITH THE ‘SEMIPALMATED’ BIT, PLEASE
‘Semipalmated’ refers to the partial webbing between their toes. There are different degrees of palmation, as these handy graphics demonstrate:
Semipalmate: in practice, very hard so see in the field e.g. plovers & sandpipers
Palmate: full webbing across the ‘front’ 3 toes, e.g. gulls
Totipalmate: all toes are fully webbed e.g. cormorants
Nonpalmate: please supply own imagination
Gregarious flight: there are sandpipers in the mix (clue: long bills)
WHAT DO THESE BIRDS EAT?
Semipalmated plovers are much like any other small shorebird foraging on beaches and foreshores. They eat insects, crustaceans and worms. Here is a bird in a promising place for its preferred diet.
ANYTHING ELSE TO LOOK OUT FOR?
Like other plover species – Wilson’s and Killdeer for example – a semipalmated will use the ‘broken wing’ ploy to lure a predator away from a nest and the eggs or chicks in it. As it flops about pathetically on the sand looking vulnerable, it actually moves gradually further away from the nest. If it comes to the crunch it is able to take wing rapidly, leaving a very puzzled predator behind.
Semipalmated plovers flying with 2 sandpipers
Credits: Alex Hughes (1, 6, 9, 10); Woody Bracey (2, 3); Tony Hepburn (4); Charles Skinner (5); Bruce Hallett (7); D Gordon E Robertson (8); Bird foot infographics people.eku.edu
“HANDSOME BIRD, BLUE EYES, LIKES FISH, SEEKS MATE…”
REDDISH EGRET ON ABACO (1)
Reddish Egrets come in two colour schemes, reddish and pure white; and both are available on Abaco. ID hint – among the 10 heron and egret species found on Abaco, these are the only ones with a black tip to the beak. In March, these birds are thinking about fish. They do that every day of the year. But they are also thinking about finding a mate. The colouring of the males intensifies, and in particular the greyish-pinkish base of its beak turns a bright ‘hi babe, how are you doing’ pink. The male RE in this post is resplendent in his breeding plumage.We encountered this RE at Crossing Rocks in the brackish pond area on the opposite side of the highway to the bonefishing jetty. This in an excellent place to check out for herons, egrets and other wading birds such as yellowlegs. The island is at its thinnest point here, with the hard dry land over which the highway passes just a few yards across. On either side it’s basically water, mangroves, and other wetland plants. The RE noticed us at the edge of the pond and put on a little display. This is unlikely to have been a ‘come on’… Conceivably, he wanted to show off his distinctive ‘bad hair day’ styling. More plausibly, he was probably put out by having his fishing disturbed. He wasn’t diverted for long, though, and soon got back to business hunting fish. Sometimes he would stand stock still, poised for a rapid strike into the water with that lethal beak. This is the RE’s classic fishing method, the static hunt. However, there are times for being proactive and chasing down the prey. While bonefishing out on the Marls, I have seen this done from a distance, especially by the white RE morphs. They splash about near the edge of the mangroves, moving back and forth, lifting their long legs high in the vegetation as they hunt down their small silver snacks. Our Crossing Rocks RE was suddenly on a mission…We had to tear ourselves away from this performance, grateful to have seen it at such close quarters. However we went back a few days later while on a birding trip to the pond at Gilpin Point. But that’s a post for another time…
Long-billed (Limnodromus scolopaceus)? Or Short-billed (Limnodromus griseus)? Which one is that over there? No, not there. There! For Abaco, the answer is very easy. The SBD is a common winter resident, whereas the LBD is an occasional casual visitor, recorded rarely and irregularly in the Northern Bahamas.So if you are looking at a Dowitcher, it’s 98% certain that’s it’s an SBD. Which is lucky – they are so similar that telling them apart is a complex ID challenge, even if seen together! Until 60 years ago they happily existed as one species until the avian powers-that-be decided to prise them apart and award them separate species status. All the birds featured here are Abaco SDBs, with one exception… More on the comparisons and differences below.
The Dowitcher’s bill is an extremely effective instrument for probing deep into low water and mud. The rapid stabbing for concealed invertebrates has been vividly described as being ‘like a sewing-machine’. A ‘Dowitcher Stitcher’. So to speak.
HOW DID THE DOWITCHER GET ITS NAME?
I had assumed that the strange name for these birds was onomatopoeic, in the same way that a Killdeer is supposed to call “Kill…Deer”. And a Bobwhite, an interrogative “Bob…White?”. When I tried to check this online, I found that the usually valuable primary sources for bird info were silent on the topic. In the end, I tracked down a Merriam Webster entry that simply said “probably of Iroquoian origin; akin to Oneida tawístawis. First Known Use: 1841”. Which left me better informed, but no wiser…
THERE’S A BUNCH OF SHOREBIRDS OVER THERE – WHAT DO SBDs SOUND LIKE?
Phoenix Birder / Xeno Canto
In the header image, the bird is foraging in shallow water. In deeper water or with softer mud, SBDs will plunge their bills in to the hilt
SHORT OR LONG – HOW ON EARTH DO I TELL?
1. HELPFUL(ISH) WAYS
On Abaco, if you see a Dowitcher the overwhelming likelihood is that it’s a SBD
The species prefer different habitats, with the LBS preferring freshwater even in coastal regions
The SBD prefers coastal areas, shorelines and brackish / muddy ponds
The SBD’s call is said to be “mellower” than the LDB – though unless you have heard both for comparison, that’s not a very useful identifier.
The body shapes are apparently subtly different, in ways I personally can only begin to guess
In breeding plumage, the species have perceptible colour / pattern differences. (If you have binoculars?)
2. CONFUSING FACTORS
LBDs may occasionally join SBDs that are foraging on open tidal flats
Actual bill length may not help, there’s an overlap – some SBDs may have longer bills and vice versa.
There are theories about bill-length / head size comparison as a field ID method. Do they work? As if!
Winter plumage of both species is very similar (grey). Both are only on Abaco in winter. Go figure.
DOES THE DOWITCHER HAVE ANY PRACTICAL APPLICATION?
Yes! In Scrabble you can form a stonking 315 words from those 9 letters, all permitted under Scrabble rules (though not my own house rules, which forbid ridiculous 2 and 3 letter words that sound invented for the purpose of winning Scrabble). Apart from the full 9 letter original, there’s one 8 letter word – ‘witherod’, a type of viburnum plant; and 13 words of 7 letters, of which I’d say 8 are in common though not everyday usage. I’ll leave you to work out the remaining 301 words…
DO YOU HAVE ANY LBD PHOTOS TAKEN ON ABACO?
I surely do. Woody Bracey photographed a pair of dowitchers together on Abaco, one SBD and one LBD. But even though this looks a pretty straightforward comparison of bill length, colouring and marking, by now I’m now so confused that I’m beginning to wish the two species could be happily reunited into one…
Credits: Bruce Hallett, Tom Sheley, Woody Bracey, past researches, the usual bird info suspects
Merlins (Falco columbarius) are fierce small falcons that are fast and agile in flight. On Abaco, they are fairly common winter residents – though finding one and managing to photograph it may take a bit of doing. And maybe a dose of luck. The ‘columbarius‘ part of their taxonomy reflects their colloquial name ‘Pigeon Hawk’. Merlins are found throughout much of the northern hemisphere. They are classified as a New World species and an Old World / Eurasian subspecies, F c aesalon. Some argue for two distinct species, the gene pools of the two versions apparently having parted company ten of thousands of years ago. The birds aren’t overly bothered by the debate.
Merlin World Range Map: yellow = summer, blue = winter
HOW DO MERLINS DIFFER FROM AMERICAN KESTRELS (AMKE)?
Slightly larger and notably heavier (thus having more speed and endurance in flight)
Different colouring, e.g. lacking the indicative reddish-browns of the AMKE
Distinctive tail-barring as against black ends to the tail feathers with a white fringe
Unlike the AMKE they don’t hover, but close in directly on the small birds that are the main prey, often flying very low to surprise the victim.
For comparison: Merlin in South Abaco, American kestrel at Sandy Point
SO JUST HOW FIERCE ARE MERLINS?
Formidable! If you are a small or even medium-sized bird, you need to keep your wits about you. Merlins are largely ‘omni-habitat’ within their range, which includes open country, shrubland, light forest, and grasslands. They are fast, agile and strong. They can fly high, at medium height or at ground level, and are expert in surprise attack and rapid pursuit of prey. If you are a large bird of prey – a red-tailed hawk, perhaps – they may attack you with ferocity. They may not actually be trying to nail you, but to get you out of their territory and their catchment area.
Most of a merlin’s prey is taken in flight, and their speciality is ‘tail-chasing’ terrified birds. Breeding pairs may hunt cooperatively, with one bird flushing prey from cover into the open for its mate to… well, you get the picture – they are clever too. They may even pursue birds that have been flushed out by another bird of prey in the vicinity.
MERLINS AND PHOTOGRAPHERS
This is a slightly fraught relationship, because Merlins do not always pose as one might wish. Sometimes they are hard to see, being fairly well camouflaged unless they choose to ‘go out on a limb’.
And sometimes they don’t play by the rules relating to light and focus, making a clear shot difficult
FALCONRY AND MEDIEVAL HISTORY
Merlins were popular birds in medieval English falconry, and according to the 1486 Boke of Seynt Albans, the ‘Marlyon’ was considered the appropriate hunting bird for a lady. This book contained an essay on hunting attributed to Dame Juliana Berners, the prioress of a Priory near St Albans, who, game lady that she must have been, also contributed to one of the earliest treatises on fishing, ‘Fysshynge wyth an Angle‘ (hence, angling).
FURTHER HISTORICAL DIGRESSION (feel free to skip to final para)
While reading up further about Dame Juliana, I came across (wiki-tnx) a wonderful ranking for birds of prey matched to status that I hadn’t encountered before. Here’s the list, from Emperor to Knave / Servant. A Tercel was / is a male falcon, especially a Peregrine or Gyrfalcon. A Musket is a sparrowhawk.
The Boke of Seynt Albans also contains list of collective nouns for animals and birds, many familiar today such as “gaggle of geese”. There are also humorous collective nouns for different professions, such as a “diligence of messengers”, a “melody of harpers”, a “blast of hunters”, “a subtlety of sergeants”, and a “superfluity of nuns”…
Merlins are still trained for hunting smaller birds; and because of their speed and agility they are used in falconry displays. Despite changing habitat, and a perceptible dip in population from the use of pesticides now banned (such as DDT), the Merlin seems to be holding its own very well 5 centuries after the Boke was written.
AND FINALLY… AUDUBON’S HANDSOME MERLINS
Credits: Becky Marvil (1 & 7); RH (2); Rhonda Pearce (3); Craig Nash (4 & 5); Gerlinde Taurer (6); Prairie Boy (8) wiki – not taken on Abaco, but I liked it; Dame Juliana Berners (1486); Magpie Pickings
THICK-BILLED VIREOS: ABACO’S ONLY PERMANENT RESIDENT VIREO
Unlike the other 7 vireo species found on Abaco seasonally or as transients, the Thick-billed Vireo Vireo crassirostris is an ever-present permanent resident of the coppice and scrub; and their unmistakeable repeating song can be heard almost everywhere.
Although TBVs are very easy to hear and track to a general area of coppice, I find actually seeing the bird creating the noise quite hard – let alone getting a clear camera shot. They always seem to be lurking several feet further away, deeper in the foliage, than the sound suggests.
Paul Driver / Xeno Canto
The main signifiers for this species, which in combination distinguish the TBV from the other vireo species on Abaco, are:
Two white wing bars
Yellow patch – usually quite prominent – between eye and beak
Thick bill – which immediately rules it out of being one of the 37 warbler species on Abaco…
There are marked colour variations in the species according to maturity, season and to an extent gender (though m & f are quite similar). Here’s one that is causing wing-bar confusion by only showing traces. It also has quite dark upper parts.
This is a very yellow TBVWhereas this one has rather anaemic colorationFinally, this pretty TBV is very delicately marked
COMMON YELLOWTHROATS ON ABACO: CHEERFUL WINTER WARBLERS
Abaco is fortunate to be home to the endemic BAHAMA YELLOWTHROAT Geothlypis rostrata, a striking bird with a dashing black mask and bright yellow body in the male. You can see it with its fellow endemics HERE. But there is similar winter resident species, the COMMON YELLOWTHROAT Geothlypis trichas, that can be seen on Abaco between October and March. Now is a very good time to look out for them. However, the two species are easy to confuse.
Common Yellowthroat (male)
Bahama Yellowthroat (male)
WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE?
SIZE – the BW is slightly larger and sturdier than the CW
BEAK – larger in the BW, and some might say it tends to be decurved
COLOUR – the BW is more colourful, with more extensive yellow underparts and mask
FEMALES – both species lack the mask and are duller; the female BW has a greyer head
HABITAT – both are found in the same areas; the CW prefers denser vegetation near water
DEBATEABLE – it seems to me the pale stripe behind the mask is usually less prominent in the BW
Common Yellowthroat male with conspicuous pale head-stripe
Both yellowthroat species are an endearing mix of shy and inquisitive. These birds are responsive to ‘pishing’, and once lured from cover they may remain nearby on low branches or shrubs watching you with interest as you watch them. Their song – similar in both species – is fairly easily imitated (or at least approximated), which may also bring them into the open – a source of great satisfaction to the amateur birder when it works. Unless it’s just coincidence, of course… The songs of the two species recorded below sound almost indistinguishable (except that the first one is professional and the second notably amateur…).
COMMON YELLOWTHROAT
Todd Wilson / Xeno Canto
BAHAMA YELLOWTHROAT
RH own recording
Female Common Yellowthroats are unassuming and quite delicate little birds. The first of these two images shows an immature bird, with its front beginning to become yellow. The second is a mature female.
Two more male Common Yellowthroats to admire…
Photo Credits: Erik Gauger (1); Tom Sheley (2); Bruce Hallett (3, 5, 6, 7); Dan Pancamo /Wiki (4); Becky Marvil (8) Audio: Xeno Canto; RH
Photo Credits: Sandy Walker, Woody Bracey, Tony Hepburn, Wiki
Finally, this pretty TBV is very delicately marked
THE BIRDS OF ABACO 