Well, although there was some confusion with Marbled Murrelet, the
concensus in Tweeterland
was indeed Pigeon Guilemot. But the interesting thing *apparently* is that
Merlin IDed it
as Thick-billed Murre when entered from Seattle, but correctly as Pigeon
Guilemot when
entered from Portland. Of course there still could be some mixup in the
input I guess.
Otherwise, does Merlin believe that Thick billed Murre is more to be
expected in Puget Sound than Portland?
Also note the remark below about John Gatchett (whom as I recall was once,
long ago, a big birder in Oregon),
so perhaps it is slightly more common there, at least of late...............
Here are the details from Charlotte Byers, the original photographer: And
yes, Charlotte, there can't be that many Nagi Abouleneins
birding on the west coast.
Hi Bob,
I had never used Merlin before the other day. I installed
it on my cell phone, then submitted the picture of the PIGU. It came up
with Thick-billed Murre and then, below in a series of very small photos,
apparently listed other nearby relatives: Pigeon Guillemot, Common Murre,
etc. Perhaps I made some kind of mistake, but that’s what I got. I
suppose the location might make a difference. The same day we took that
photo, a man named John Gatchet (big birder on the Olympic Peninsula) says
he saw a Thick-billed Murre, although he didn’t get a photo.
At this point I think my bird is a Pigeon Guillemot that
somehow confused Merlin.
BTW is that Nagi Aboulenein that wrote the note to you? He
and I follow one another’s photos on Flickr.
Cheers, Charlotte
On Sat, Jan 5, 2019 at 11:33 AM David Irons <llsdirons@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Don’t know what Merlin is calling this, but it is a juvenile Pigeon
Guillemot.
Sent from my iPhone
On Jan 5, 2019, at 10:17 AM, Robert O'Brien <baro@xxxxxxx> wrote:
The attached photo was recently posted from Puget Sound on Tweeters, the
Washington equivalent to OBOL
So, what is the ID of this alcid?
AND what did the Cornell ID app *Merlin* come up with?
I don't have any experience with *Merlin* but it has been discussed
several times on OBOL & Tweeters and is said to work very well,
using both the photo and distribution data from eBird.
I have encouragement from the photographer to 're-tweet' the photo herein.
Bob OBrien
<IDthis Alcid.jpg>
