Shorebird ID ?

[Dan Brown]

I am assuming that what I have here is an adult (right) and juv. (left) Long-billed Dowitchers. I captured this yesterday in the Sacramento valley (heavily cropped image). The birds are flying only a couple of feet apart. The left hand bird with the short bill and contrasty underwing is the bird in question? Short-billed? As I was on site, I did not here any calls that sounded like Short-billed Dowitcher, but I'm not sure. We do get Short-bills here, but not commonly. What do you all think?

[Julian Hough]

Dan,

Overall proportions (bill length, position of the eye and apparent leg length) would indicate that the left bird is a Short-billed and the right bird a Long-billed, so I agree with your id.

From the photo I do not know what age they are, but suspect that both are probably juveniles, though I can't really be sure without seeing feather detail. Ad. Long-billed's finish moult in October-ish which includes primaries, so it's hard to tell what age the Long-billed is since juvs and adults could show fresh flight feathers at this time of year.

Best,

Julian

[Ilija Dukovski]

What's with the eye position? I read somewhere that LB have the eye closer
to the imaginary line continuation of the bill than the SB. Is that right,
and how reliable is it in your opinion? Thanks.

[Wayne Richardson]

Hi Dan

I'd agree with Julian that we probably have both species here.

In addition to points made by Julian, the jizz appears right & tail barring would support the ID too. Note that, while the wider white stripes eliminates LBD (LH bird) the narrower white bars (RH bird) are actually OK for both species. This is because SBD exhibit much more individual variation.

Cheers: Wayne

[Dan Brown]

Dan,

Overall proportions (bill length, position of the eye and apparent leg length) would indicate that the left bird is a Short-billed and the right bird a Long-billed, so I agree with your id.

From the photo I do not know what age they are, but suspect that both are probably juveniles, though I can't really be sure without seeing feather detail. Ad. Long-billed's finish moult in October-ish which includes primaries, so it's hard to tell what age the Long-billed is since juvs and adults could show fresh flight feathers at this time of year.

Best,

Julian

Thanks for the ID info Julian. I too am curious regarding your comment about "position of the eye"! Are you referring to the position between the bill base and the back of the head? which seems to be what I am seeing (SBD's eye being closer to the bill)

[Julian Hough]

It seems as though I need to expand on my comment on the eye position comment.
Basically, to my eyes, the best way to describe this is that I personally feel that on many Long-billed's I see, the eye is set back farther in the face, so that the best analogy would be Long-billed's look like Woodcocks and Short-billed's look like Snipes.

Hope that kind of explains what I meant..it's one of those personal "intangible" things I think..

Julian

[Dan Brown]

It seems as though I need to expand on my comment on the eye position comment.
Basically, to my eyes, the best way to describe this is that I personally feel that on many Long-billed's I see, the eye is set back farther in the face, so that the best analogy would be Long-billed's look like Woodcocks and Short-billed's look like Snipes.

Hope that kind of explains what I meant..it's one of those personal "intangible" things I think..

Julian

Thanks again Julian! That does seem to be the case the birds in my image here!

[Ilija Dukovski]

Long-billed's look like Woodcocks and Short-billed's look like Snipes.

Got it, makes sense from this image. Thanks.