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Home , Green sandpiper, Tringa, Woodcock

RARE OCCURRENCE IDENTIFICATION

First Green , ochropus, for - Notjust the where Ben King, Lawrence Balch, Jon Dunn, Davis W. Finch, but the howõ and George E. Hall, and Theodore Tobish whyk,too. HEFIRST Green sighting specks on back; no wing bar; rump With these two essential for North America was made by white (his drawing shows it abutting volumes, you'll know not only Terry Savaloja on June 13, 1978 in a squarely against dark back); tail white exactlywhere in 26 statesto find native and migratory birds, marshy pond near the east end of the with 3-4 very distinct dark bars near tip; you'll better understand their east/west runway, about 50m from the underside of wings dark, contrasting behavioronce you locate them. beach on Attu Island, the westernmost with white belly; breast appeared darker of the Aleutian Island chain, Alaska. than Wood's, and juncture with white The weatherwas overcastwith light rain, belly had a look to A Guide to wind NNW, temperature 40øF. Unfor- it; had a pale eyebrow; call a 3-note tunately, the observation could not be whistle." verified, since there were no other birders on the island. However, his field notes do suggestthat his identification On May 22, 1979, another Green Finding was correct. His notes are as follows: Sandpiperwas seenin Henderson Marsh East of the "observed for 30-45 minutes, as close as at Attu Island by 30 observerswho saw Mississippi- -'l•' 25 ft.; flushed three or four times; size the bird in flight, heard it call, and byOLIN SEWALL medium, as or a little watched it, through a battery of scopes, PEIWINGILL, JR. larger; dark bill straight;legs dark; up- which includedtwo Questarsstanding at A selectionof the Birding Book perparts blackish with a few white about 80m distant. The bird was under Society.,and long recognizedas the best book of its kind, this "well-organized, time tested ...highly recommendedbook" (Journalof Wildli• Management) RAREBIRD alsofeatures splendid (and very. helpful)drawings by notedbird artist George Miksch Sutton. THEWEST _ $7.95, paper by Don Roberson CoversStatus and ldentificatio•'.':('-:-:_:•%•, .- Watching ofRarities in: ,•.'.•-'•._._3•f• Birds Oregon '• • ""::,'e• Washinton • ' An Introduction . . g . , to Ornithology byROGER E PASOUIER Tn olovlat•s Hlustrate rari- • 'c• How does an owl catch a mouse it cannotsee? Why do male birds sing more than females?The answersto theseand hundreds of other questionsare in this "enlighteningbook for all bird watchers." -- LES LINE, Editor, AudubonßForeword by Roger Tory. PetersonßIllustrated by MargaretLaFarge. $5ß95, paper • • Add$1.25 •• per bookfor Two newadditions to a growingseries of shipping;Calif. residents add informativeoutdoor reading-and-refer- ence publishedin quality paperbackby 6%tax ($1.20). Publishedby the author and availablefrom: Hou•jhtonM• Co maany 2 Park Street, Boston, MA 02107 PUBLICATIONS St•,•k•a Sh•w• P.O. Box 985 Wood Pacific Grove, CA 93950 SpoonbillSandpiper

Volume 34, Number 3 319 observation for about one and one-half Standing:mantle and rump verydark, piper, the bird constantlyraised and hours between 1100 and 1500. An early darker than in Wood Sandpiper,the col- loweredthe rear part of its body. evening search for it was unsuccessful. or described as "blackish brown", An attempt at photographywas alsoun- "dark gray", "dark gray-brown", or successful.Visibility was good under a "green-gray"; the mantle was speckled T pattern,HESIZE, voice SHAPEand general manner plumageof flight low overcast, the wind about 15 knots. with whitish, but not as heavily as in of the Green Sandpiperare similarin all Eight of the observershad previousex- Wood Sandpiper, giving an impression but minor detailsto the SolitarySand- perience with Green Sandpipers, and of more uniform, darker coloration; piper, with the strikingexception of the two of them, Ben King and Arnold primariesblackish and unmarked;upper all-white upper tail covertsand the white Small, had seenthem commonlyin tail covertswhite; tail white with three or tail with black bands of the Green Sand- only a few weekspreviously. The follow- four black bands, only the terminal piper. The Solitary Sandpiperhas the ing descriptionis derived from detailed band extendingall the way to the sides, upper tail coverts and tail broadly field notes taken by the authors. and the innermost band broken in the blackishdown the center,with black and In flight: the entire underwing ap- center; crown and nape slightly paler white bars on the sides. peared blackish (strikingly different and grayer than mantle, the crown with The was to be ex- from the dusky of the Wood Sandpipers narrowwhitish streaks; whitish eyebrow pected in the western Aleutians because that were also present), contrasting not prominent in front of eye, and in- of its rangein EasternAsia. It is regard- stronglywith the white belly. The white distinctbehind eye; narrow white eye- ed as a rare migrant or straggler to tail and upper tail coverts were cut off ring not bold as on SolitarySandpiper; Sakhalin, the Kuriles and Kamchatka squarelyfrom the otherwiseuniformly eyes dark; sides of head ashy gray to (Ivanov, 1976), and nests in the Amur dark upperparts.Its flight was similar to gray-brown, with a faint streaked ap- area and on the Shantar Islands of the that of the Solitary Sandpiperwith deep, pearance,especially on paler cheeks;bill easternOkhotsk Sea (Dement'ev, 1951). jerky wing beats. The bird appeared blackish,looking somewhatlonger than The Green Sandpiperappeared on At- slightly larger and heavier than Wood in Wood Sandpiper;underparts of body tu at the sametime as many other East Sandpiper.The call was a loud, ringing, entirely white, except for narrow dark Asian speciesfollowing a stormMay 18 melodious, peet-weet-weet or pwi-pwi- streakson entire upper breast, the sides and 19. A heavy three-day "wave" oc- pwt, very much like call of Solitary appearingdarker than the center; legs curred on May 20-22, includingup to 12 Sandpiper, but quite different from dusky greenish, darker than those of Bean Geese,several Smews, two or three Wood Sandpiper'sfi-fi-fi. Wood Sandpiper. Like a Spotted Sand- Spotted Redshanks, two Greenshanks, perhaps 40 Wood Sandpipers,one or two Common Sandpipers,two Rufous- necked Stints, one Temminck's Stint, two Long-toed Stints, 26 Common Black-headed , ten or more Yellow Wagtails, five or six Olive Tree-Pipits (Anthushodgsont), one PetchoraPipit, TANZANIA,!.AFRi(A more than 50 Red-throatedPipits, five Bramblings,and five or six RusticBunt- 18& Days,All Inclusive,BiFdeF Safaris ings.The weathercleared on the evening Study,Learn and Photograph Spectacular Wildlife and Scenery of of May 22 and nearly all thesespecies Mt. Kilimanjaroß Serengetiß Mt. Meru ß LakeManyara had disappearedby the followingday. ß NgorngoroCraterß OlduvaiGorge ß Tarangireß Ruaha Aside from the authors, who were the ß Selous ß Mikumi ß Usambara ß Mkumazi leadersof the threetour groupson Attu, the other 24 observers were: Benton LIMITED TO 5 PARTICIPANTS * NO RUSH APPROACH Basham, Jeffrey Basham, Harold R. Baxter, Jo Blanich, Joe Burgiel, Eliza- Over700 birds& 100mammal checklisted for areas beth Campbell, Michael D. Green, KatherineIrey, Ken Irey, Ken Johnson, Arranged& Conductedby SAFARI DEPARTURE DATES: John Keenleyside,Douglas Kraus, Ger- Dr. Jim C. Hitchcock ald Maisel, Thompson Marsh, Larry Field Biologist/Naturalist JUNE 20, 1980 JULY 11, 1980 Peavler, Cliff Pollard, Gerald Rosen- AUGUST 1, 1980 band, Lawrence Ryel, Rose Ryel, Ar- JAN. 9, 1981 JAN. 30, 1981 nold Small, H. Granville Smith, Macklin Smith, G. ShumwaySuffel, JamesM. for information write: Vardaman.

ECOLO(HCAL /1 CKNO WLEDGEMENTS STUDY (ROUI)S Mrs. Marion E. Steeves was kind enough to translate the relevant section RO. BOX 1288, NEVADA CITY, CA 95959 of Ivanov (1976). We wishto thank the personnel of the U.S. Coast Guard

320 AmericanBirds, May 1980 Loran Station at Attu for their generous hospitality and the U.S. Fish and Wild- The Last Word life Service for its assistance.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGISTS' UN- ION. 1957. Check-list of North American Birds. Amer. Ornithol. Union. URREGIONAL REPORTS areheading 171 additional unnamed contributors." DEMENT'EV, G.P., N.A. GLADKOV, ET into trouble. But it is a welcome Hugh Kingery actually lists 259 unnam- /IL. 1951. Birds of the Soviet Union. kind of trouble, the kind that stems ed contributors. But the time may well (Trans. from Russian in 1969 by Israel Program for Scientific Translation, from growing success,rather than fail- be near at hand, when somethingrather Jerusalem). Vol. III. ure. The trouble is that there are now drastic will be required. Should we list IVANOV, A.I. 1976. Katalog ptits Sovet- too many people birding, seeingnote- observers for very important records skogo Soyuza (Checklist of Birds of the worthy birds, and sending reports of only? Should we use only initials, and Soviet Union). Leningrad, "Nauka". 276 pp. (In Russian). them in to our Regional Editors. The oncea year publishone consolidatedob- KESSEL, B., and D.D. GIBSON. 1978. Sta- boom in birding, which would appear to serverlist for eachregion? Should we re- tus and Distribution of Alaska Birds. be still in its infancy, is resulting in the duce the type-size from the present 8- Studies Arian Biol. 1, Cooper Ornithol. swampingof someContributing Editors point (legible)to 7-point (eye-strain)for Soc. 100 pp. and through them the Regional Editors, observer lists? Should we eliminate ob- VAURIE, C. 1965. The Birds of the Palearc- tic Fauna. A SystematicReference, Order with such masses of material to read, server names completely as does British Non-Passcriformcs.Witherby, London. consider,digest, and analyse,that some Birds, allowing the original documents --c/o Ornithology Dept., American editors have thrown up their hands and to remainthe official records?If we stop Museum of Natural History, Central resignedrather than face the pressures publishingmost or all observernames, Park West at 79th St., New York, N.Y. and tensions of the evaluation process. will observersstop sendingin records? 10024 (King), Wilbur Wright College, Others are suffering, quietly or other- We recognizethat there are certainjusti- Chicago, Ill. 60634 (Balch), 17437 Ran- wise, with more fortitude, but the time fied elementsof pride and prestigein- cho St., Encino, Calif. 91316 (Dunn), and effort consumed still mounts, and volved in having records attributed in South Road, East Kingston, N.H. 03827 with them go the nagging regrets for thesereports. How important are they? (Finch), Naval Arctic ResearchLabora- "the ones left out." They are a heroic We would like to have the view of some tory, Barrow, Alaska 99723 (Hall), Box breed, these Regional Editors. of our readers,and will publishthe most 81109, College, Alaska 99708 (Tobish). This issue of American Birds incor- porates57 + pagesof Regionalreports, lessspace for maps and photographs.It ' Enter is, perhaps, somewhat shorter than the - theworld reports dealing with the spring and au- tumn migrations. This editor has rather PO Box !96 .. of Questers PLANETARIUMSTATION ruthlessly deleted a number of records NEWYORK. N¾ that will appear in Christmas Bird ,00,, U.S.A. Counts, in our next issue (but has left •en you l•avel wilfi Ourslets. you fiave hundreds of others). And yet, the num- advanla•e ot our tnowled•e ot l•e Iravol ber of cited observers, both within the (212)866-7923/.• And our ex•eience of lfie naluml world •e text and in the observer lists, runs to yWhynot go Iravel peo•essionals.And our only Ioue peo•mm •oeldw•de Nalure Tours. more than 2500. In addition, individuals fj birdingin Under lhe leadership el an accompanyin• whoserecords were reported by clubs, or // with the people nalumlisl. *e •aecfi out lfie planIs and , were disguisedas "m.ob.," or "et al.," •rds and flowers. rain lo•esls, •unlains, and whoknow itbest? probably represent several hundred m•lons we explore AI the same lime, we •nclude more. For the observer lists alone, the 1981 spaceoccupied in this issueruns to 107 a•cfiaoolo•cal sties. and •ople. ff BirdingTours Tile cureertl Dieecto• el •oel•w•de column inches,or 3.75 pages,not count- NORTHINDIA Toursdescribes • Iouesvaey•n• from • Io •B days ing spacesfor initials in the text. It is a 23 Jan.- 17 Feb. and •oin• Io vifluallyeve• pail el lhe world In- sizable, costly, and probably necessary cited are TrioAmazon, Peru, Patagonia, •os. Hawaii, AlasLa, Doalfi Valley,Everglades, item. We often wonder whether there is SRI LANKA (Ceylon) LadaLfi. Sei LanLa, Iceland, Scolland, Greece, any periodical anywhere in the world 14 Feb. - 2 Mar. Auslralia, and New Zealand Tourpa•es are small. that is literally put togetherby the coop- lfie pace leisurely.and iline•anesunusual (Tours may be gakencorue•utively or separately) erativeefforts of so many persons.For it CBg or wrife Ouosfors or see your Travel is a fact that everyone who submits a Both tours lead by BEN KING. A•enf forby lotyour lroe copy el fhe Dirocfory Asia's foremost field birder, record, or shares in an observation, is a author of "A Field Guide to part of our operation. the Birds of South-East Asia" and currently writing "A Field T PRESENT,wecan cope with the Identification Handbook to the QQUESTERS ong listsof names,although we ap- Birds of the Indian Region." uestersTours & Travel, Inc. prove of the way Kim Eckert, at the end Write for itineraries. Dept. AB380, 25? Park AvenueSouth of his long list of names, added "and New York, N.Y. 10010 ß (212) 673-3120

Volume 34, Number 3 321