Hi Cody and all,
A Purple Martin in January would be a very rare sighting, indeed. Makes me
wonder if we can totally discount one of the Central or South American
martin species? A Southern Martin in Oregon - why not?! :)
A very intriguing sighting, at any rate!
Hendrik
On Wed, Jan 20, 2016 at 5:01 PM, Cody W. Smith <kingsalmon92@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Hello all,
Today I was out hunting at the Fern Ridge Wildlife Area in the West Coyote
Unit. Around 10:00 a bird flew by me that was swallow-like and my first
thought was that I had seen a barn swallow. Upon observing it flying around
about 5 meters off of the water I immediately recognized it as too large to
be a barn swallow. I am almost completely certain that what I observed was
a PURPLE MARTIN.
Purple Martins are a species that I am quite familiar with and can
recognize easily. It had a forked tail and longer wings, swallow-like
flight and appearance, and an overall uniformly dark body (however the
lighting did not make it easy to distinguish the iridescent purple
coloration). I did not hear it give any vocalizations. It was too large to
be a similar Swallow species such as tree or barn and did not appear to be
nor behave like a European Starling. (Any other species I should consider
as possibilities are definitely welcome)
When I got home I started looking at eBird records and see that there are
no listed observations of Purple Martins in January at all. Possibly this
was an injured bird that got stuck here? If this is, indeed, a Purple
Martin it would definitely be a good record.
--
*My Kindest Personal Regards,*
*Cody W. Smith*
*p 541-788-7269 <541-788-7269> *
