About 10 days ago early in the morning I was able to get excellent looks at a
Common Nighthawk, Chordeiles minor, [CONI] as it landed across the street in a
large tree directly in front of me. The most notable of all characters for
this CONI was the immense amount of buffy coloration on the back and especially
the wing bars. The buffy color was reminiscent of LENI, but I know for certain
this was CONI. Most of this species that I have seen have been on BBS routes
in South Texas which have some buffy on the back, but I have not ever seen such
total buffy wing bars.
I have studied BLOT [a lot] and absent a specimen, have eliminated five of the
seven subspecies occurring in Texas. Based on all descriptions I believe this
to have been a C. m. howelli, which incidentally seems to be the most prevalent
in No TX. According to what I read in BLOT, it could have been a C.m. minor.
Does anyone have experience with the ssp of CONI to say from a probability
standpoint this was likely C m howelli versus C m minor or other ssp?
Thanks in advance for any/all thoughts,
Lamont Brown
Proud to be a Veteran
Denton, Texas
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