[Bristol-Birds] Pyrrhuloxia investigation in Washington Co., VA 22 Feb 2015
- From: "BBC Net" <jwcoffey@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "'bristol-birds'" <bristol-birds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 22 Feb 2015 19:53:54 -0500
From Wallace Coffey
Bristol, TN
22 February 2015
I spent Sunday afternoon driving over Southwest Virginia checking on
unusual/questionable birds reported during the last few days during
the snowstorm/Great Backyard Bird Count.
Most fascinating was a serious account of a Pyrrhuloxia believed to
have been seen by a Washington County, VA observer.
Sometimes these reports are very difficult to run down because the
initial reports appear without email, phone numbers or addresses
to which I don't have access. A couple of days of investigation
and hours of effort found her.
It would have been a bit more easy by being crude, intrusive and storming
her.
I did not arrive on her doorstep with a camera in hand to suggest
I wanted my own photo of the bird or expected it might be there.
The lady who believes she found this species is not a birder as we
know birders. She is a former west coast person from Silicon Valley of
California.
She got a good look at the bird. She has spent hours and hours
(4 hours today) waiting at her window feeder with a camera
trying to get a photo. She has a wonderful technical background. Is
very intelligent and objective and very much aware of how far fetched
the observation is and how rare and few records are known in eastern
North America. She was not participating in the Great Backyard Bird
Count.
She knew her observation was so desperately rare that someone
must be told what she believed she saw.
Of many thousands of birds reported by hundreds of observers
during the last few days, I can say I read every species reported
and tried to filter how to handle each.
There were only three (3) that turned out to be amazing. This is the
one that was most problematic and, frankly, the most scary.
The observer is asking us to wait and see if she can get a
photo. I coached her carefully about how to set up her background so
the location can be confirmed in any eventual photo opportunity. She
asked lots of questions and was fascinated about the process.
She is a long-time Programmer/Analyst with a major national
company and writes specialized software.
This is not a situation where someone is going to Photoshop us.
She is so convincing, serious and focused that it is more than
evident that she is a careful and detailed individual. We talked
at great length about dealing with amazing rare bird observations
and documenting the finds.
She was not shocked at the response. She was not nervous about
questions. She was not defensive that anyone might be interested.
All of us know full well about being careful with rare and almost
impossible bird finds. I have been doing that for 50 years and
been on both ends of this kind of situation. She certainly has
my attention. Now let's wait and see.
Pyrrhuloxia (1) Reported Feb 21, 2015 at a feeder, Washington County, VA
Comments: "I have never seen one of these before and wasted a lot of time
looking for pictures and descriptions of cardinal plumage variations. I
thought it was a mutant cardinal (LOL). But there was a female northern
cardinal nearby and it was easy to see when they were near each other that
this bird was different. I'm very familiar with our standard cardinals and
I've never seen one with a pink (bubblegum pink!) breast before, especially
not with charcoal grey wings. If I had realized it was so unusual I would
have taken a photo, but by the time I figured out what it was, it had had
its fill of sunflower seeds and flown away. The cardinal stayed behind,, so
they weren't together. This link is the closest image I could find to the
bird I saw.
http://www.tringa.org/images/9628_Pyrrhuloxia_01-20-2012_1.jpg
The one at my feeder had much darker wings/back (dark charcoal grey), but
the head, breast and tail looked almost identical-- "my" bird had more pink
on the breast with very little grey mixed in, and a very clear demarcation
between the pink breast
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