GAME: name that bird!

[Soukous]

sorry @@Peter Connan I'm pretty sure it is not

[offshorebirder]

I will take one more stab before letting others have some chances.

 

@@Soukous - what about a Four-banded Sandgrouse?

[kittykat23uk]

I will guess yellow throated sandgrouse.

[inyathi]

I wasn't going to go for this one, I thought I would let everyone else have a go and hope the someone else gets this, however I think this might be one that hasn't been mentioned yet, the black-faced sandgrouse Pterocles decoratus.

[Soukous]

@@inyathi, you have us all eating your dust yet again

 

Black-faced sandgrouse it is - the male

 

Here's what it should look like

 

 

The female's plumage is similar but different

 

Edited August 28, 2015 by Soukous

[kittykat23uk]

Damn i was debating between those two!

[offshorebirder]

Well done @@inyathi.

 

That was a good challenge @Soukous; not too difficult but not too easy.

[Soukous]

Well done @@inyathi.

 

That was a good challenge @Soukous; not too difficult but not too easy.

 

'not too difficult' except for @@inyathi - maybe we should give him a handicap, like taking away his monitor

[PCNW]

@@Soukous with all of my extensive avian knowledge I was going to guess yellow eyed racing striped herringboned little squatty thing....wasn't even close this time dang it.

Edited August 28, 2015 by PCNW

[kittykat23uk]

LOL!!

[inyathi]

There are lots of birds that have cryptic plumage but the pattern and colours in this case strongly suggested a sandgrouse though it could possibly have been a bustard or if it were not an African bird then perhaps a hen pheasant of some kind. However a sandgrouse certainly looked the most likely to me and seemed to be the consensus amongst other suggestions.

 

There are 16 species of sandgrouse found throughout the drier parts of Africa and Asia and a lot of them do have very similar plumage but if you can see the face and the chest then it’s not too difficult to tell them apart. Only having a small section of the birds back to go on this required a bit more thought. Of course distribution always helps not counting the Madagascan only 8 species are Sub Saharan, thinking about the places @@Soukous might have been one of these species seemed most likely rather than a North African and or Asian species. Once the chestnut-bellied had been ruled out, of the remaining ones that looked like they might have the right plumage the black-faced has the widest distribution in East Africa so this marked it out as the obvious choice. A quick look at some photos confirmed that the plumage matched.

 

I don’t want to keep picking birds from the same places so I haven’t quite decided on the next one yet but as soon as I have I’ll post a new photo.

[inyathi]

Does anyone have any suggestions as to what this bird might be?

 

[inyathi]

Has everyone forgotten ths game or does no one want to have a go at this one?

 

As I’ve said a few times it always helps to know where people have been but I confess this is the only photo I’ve ever posted from this country, after a few really quite hard birds recently I thought this would be a nice easy one I will give some more helpful clues if no one offers an answer.

[Peter Connan]

You have me stumped...

Not too difficult though.

[Tom Kellie]

Has everyone forgotten ths game or does no one want to have a go at this one?

 

As I’ve said a few times it always helps to know where people have been but I confess this is the only photo I’ve ever posted from this country, after a few really quite hard birds recently I thought this would be a nice easy one I will give some more helpful clues if no one offers an answer.

 

~ @@inyathi

 

The clue of most value to me would be to verify whether or not it's an adult rather than a juvenile of its species.

Tom K.

[kittykat23uk]

It's an LBJ, could be anything! I will get the ball rolling with chiffchaff.

[inyathi]

@@kittykat23uk No this young lady's not a chiffchaff but you’re in the right neighbourhood.

 

[kittykat23uk]

Okay well then another guess, a blackcap! But not a very well marked one, a juvenile or female as you suggest? I would have expected the cap to be a richer brown if it were an adult female - that's what threw me, assuming I am right this time!

[inyathi]

@@kittykat23uk I thought I would put you and @@Soukous's ornithological knowledge to the test with a home grown bird which is why I thought this wouldn’t prove too hard. It’s certainly a female blackcap not a bird I see very often and at least in this photo it does look like it’s probably a young bird but in some of the other shots it looks a little more like an adult. If it was a mature female then as you say it should have a browner or slightly more reddish brown cap, I didn’t want to go with a better shot as that might have given too much away. There aren’t very many British birds that would prove really difficult for a British birder or at least none that I have photos of.

 

Over to you

 

[kittykat23uk]

I get them in my garden, bit embarrassed that I didn't spot the cap first time! Hopefully I haven't posted this bird before:

2015-09-05_03-40-21 by Jo Dale, on Flickr

[inyathi]

@@kittykat23uk

 

This one is a bit of a challenge it looks to me like it could be a chat, the background doesn’t give too much away other than it’s on a rocky coast somewhere if it’s an African species then that suggests perhaps somewhere on the Cape Coast. So I’m going to guess this could be a southern ant-eating chat Myrmecocichla formicivora as I assume there’s no reason why you couldn't see one beside the sea.

 

Of course I may have it entirely wrong and it may not be a chat or even an African bird.

[kittykat23uk]

Yes you have nailed the general location. The photo was taken around the cape in South Africa. You have also got quite close to the species.

[inyathi]

Well in that case my guess is that it is a female mountain wheatear Oenanthe monticola

[Peter Connan]

Boulder chat?

[kittykat23uk]

Nope and Nope. Still close though.