Hey Richard, Your photos show a Dusky Flycatcher in a pretty typical late hatch-year plumage. Exposed gape and bright wash (thought not as bright as Hammond's this time of year) point to it being a young of the year. Hammond's appears structurally quite different as far as empids go; tiny dark bill, very long primaries, large-looking head, and short tail. Least Flycatchers generally show stronger contrast (browner upperparts, paler underparts) not to mention a shorter tail than this bird.
Empids of any species seem to call more or less frequently presumably depending on their level of excitement. The point is, this can't be used as an ID mark. Best, David Tonnessen Colorado Springs, CO On Friday, September 11, 2020 at 3:42:17 PM UTC-6 richardi...@gmail.com wrote: > Hi folks, > > Three knowledgeable birders responded to my ID request, making their cases > for three different IDs: Least, Dusky, and Hammond's. > > Here is what respondents have said: > > 1) I vote for Hammond's. Teardrop eyering and darkish bill = Hammonds or > Dusky. Big head, thick neck (Dusky looks smaller headed with a normal > thickness to neck). Hammond's molts before migration so they often look > bright: gray head, green back, yellowish below (to my eye, head-back > contrast not as obvious with Dusky). If you have any pics that show the > primary projection, I bet it is long. The long wings make the tail look > short (compared to Dusky). Tail flick means nothing for empids, as they > all do it to some degree. Supposedly Gray flick starts with downward > motion, all the rest start with upward motion. VERY hard to see the > initial direction of the flick. > > 2) I think this is a Least Flycatcher. It's got an orange lower mandible, > white throat, dark wings, round crown, and messy white eye ring. > > 3) I would certainly lean strongly to Dusky. Bill color, head shape and > bill proportion, the belly/chest pattern, the eye-ring less distinct all > support Dusky. We have banded over a dozen this past couple of weeks at > Barr Lake and he would fit right in with those we handled. We do measure > all Empids to verify our visual ID's as some can be quite confusing > including a really small Willow we caught yesterday. > > I'm posting an additional photo below, perhaps to make the ID more > certain. After 24 years of birding in Colorado, I still lack > self-confidence in IDing empids. I don't feel so inadequate now that more > knowledgeable birders disagree. Anybody else like to take a stab? > > My experience in the field: the bird seemed to call more frequently than > Duskies do, but with a similar "whit." The bird seemed smaller, more > compact, and more colorful than Duskies. It flittled very actively, rarely > staying on the same perch for more than 30 seconds. > > Lastly, I should say that, unlike Ted Floyd's mystery posts, this post has > no answer key. :-) > > Here's the additional photo: > > [image: image.png] > > And the photo I posted yesterday: > [image: image.png] > > Thanks, > > Richard Trinkner > Boulder > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Colorado Birds" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to cobirds+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/cobirds/03f15004-2312-47d8-b58a-56605f5f5945n%40googlegroups.com.
