Dave,
Interesting comments. I would like to chip in my two cents worth, but first a
couple of disclaimers. (1) I have zero experience with immature Bullock's at
this season. (2) My views of the MSC oriole were rather brief, perhaps for a
minute and a half. I had good looks, but not time enough to evaluate all the
plumage features. That said, upon viewing the bird I could understand why it
was originally thought to be a Bullock's. The lower belly and vent area were
not as bright yellow as the rest of the underparts, being more whitish suffused
with yellow. There was not a clean break between the yellow of the breast and a
white belly, or with the white of the belly with the undertail coverts, as is
apparently shown by some Bullock's. Note I said some. From the online photos I
looked at I could see that on some Bullock's this mark is prominent, and on
some it is not. I judged this point to be age related, as it was more prominent
on younger immature birds than ones which had already gained most of their
black bib. In any case, the MSC bird showed only a suffusion of mix of white
with yellow on the belly and undertail coverts, with yellow being the
predominate color. I do not think this factor rules out the possibility of the
bird being an Orchard Oriole.
Without side by side comparison with Bullock's it was hard to get a good
feeling for the size of the MSC bird, It seemed small, but how small is a
matter of subjective interpretation.
If the field guides can be trusted, the development of the black throat bib
should take place about three months earlier in Bullock's than in Orchard. By
January an immature Bullock's is supposed to show a significant black bib. The
MSC bird was just beginning to show a trace of black on the throat, barely
visible except when one was looking at it face on.
I paid special attention to the bill. On the MSC bird it definitely showed a
slight curve, which would be the case for an Orchard Oriole, and would not be
true for Bullock's.
I did not detect any orange color in the plumage at all. The discrepancy
between my observation and yours could be related to light. You saw it on a day
of bright sunlight. When I saw it the sky was overcast.
On a bird so controversial it would seem foolish for me to come right out and
insist that the MSC oriole was an Orchard. I would say the jury is still out,
and will be interested to hear what the ID Frontiers people have to say. But I
saw nothing about the bird which I think would completely eliminate the
possibility of it being an Orchard Oriole.
Darrel
From: "David Irons" <llsdirons@xxxxxxx>
To: "OBOL Oregon Birders Online" <obol@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, January 5, 2016 8:59:12 AM
Subject: [obol] Newport Oriole Photos -- Back to square one
Greetings All
I am back to square one on the Newport (Hatfield Marine Science Center) oriole
that I spent considerable time watching and photographing this past weekend. We
finally made it home last night and I have had some time to study my photos in
detail. Here is a gallery of images that I took this weekend.
http://www.birdfellow.com/photos/gallery/954-newport-oregon-oriole-jan-1-2-2016 ;
In all the photos the bird looks more orange than it did in the field. Several
experienced observers have looked at photos of this bird taken by others and
concluded that it is a Bullock's, which was my initial opinion before seeing
the bird in life. It has more extensive yellow/orange on the underparts than
female or immature Bullock's typically do in my experience and the color on the
breast is quite rich compared to a Bullock's. It also has really rich yellow
undertail coverts, which seem more intense than I would expect on a Bullock's.
I've never seen a female/immature Bullock's that looks like this, although I
have found a couple of images of similar birds labeled as Bullock's online.
The bird seems small when I look at my photos of it next to House Finches and
House Sparrows. In my initial views (the first few photos in this gallery) it
seemed very round headed, short-billed and strongly lemon yellow below. When at
the feeder in the courtyard behind the science center, I do think that
refraction of light off of the windows and the big hummingbird feeder full of
red nectar may be accentuating how orange the bird looks in photos.
Some have commented on the dark eyeline. It really doesn't have much of an
eyeline behind the eye. Where the tracts of feathers come together behind the
eye there is an indentation of trough that creates a shadow effect, which from
several photo angles looks like a darker eyeline. The amount of dark in the
lores does not seem to fit Orchard Oriole, which is what I thought this bird
was as I looked at in the field, particularly those initial views of it in
bright sun sitting in the myrtle tree in front of the science center. I'm not
sure what this bird is now, but I think that the orange coloration is
consistent enough in all the photos, even those away from the hummingbird
feeder, to conclude that it's not an Orchard.
I've never spent much time where Bullock's winter, so perhaps young birds can
be this colorful below, but there don't seem to be any illustrations of such in
any of the major field guides and there are very few photos of birds looking
like this that are labeled as Bullock's online. The possibility of Bullock's X
Baltimore or perhaps Bullock's X Hooded probably need to be explored. I plan to
share this gallery on the ID-Frontiers list tonight after work. I look forward
to hearing what some of those folks have to say.
Dave Irons
