Greetings... Reading through the Wheeler eastern North America raptors
book, it's striking how many juvenile and sub-adult characteristics
overlap among the assorted anatum and tundrius Peregrines. I guess
that's because they're the same species! Anyway . . . I don't know if
the bird is tundrius or not, but in his descriptions of first cycle--I
think he's using juvenile here in the book as a basically equivalent
term--Wheeler describes a slight break in the malar stripe near the
gape on the anatum-type ("mudblood"--a good term) birds, and seems to
suggest that this is typical regardless of how wide the malar stripe
is and regularly found in anatum peregrines. Allan Claybon's photo ".
. . .6148" seems to show a break in the malar stripe, at about the
gape. http://www.flickr.com/photos/nsxbirder/5318216148/in/photostream/
Of course, that could be a photo artifact, too. Maybe I'm seeing
something in the photo that's not visible in the field? And I'm not
sure it's as evident in the other photo of the perched bird:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nsxbirder/5317964599/in/photostream/ but
you could make a case for it being there.
Laura Keene's flight photos are interesting--assuming it's the same
bird. She has these on her flicker home page at present:
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/keeneone/).
Wheeler has notes about the state of molt, etc., in these birds. I'm
too lazy and tired and it doesn't make sense to me tonight. Come to
think of it, Brian Wheeler is an approachable and friendly guy. If
someone were to drop him a line, I bet he'd have some thoughts.
It's too bad that there isn't something more specifically obvious to
distinguish this age class of tundrius Peregrines from eastern
Pergrines the way that there is for the "prairie" race of Merlin from
other Merlins!
Take care,
---Mike Busam
West Chester
On Tue, Jan 11, 2011 at 5:24 PM, Russell, David E. Dr.
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Greetings!
>
> I was intrigued by some photos taken of a Peregrine Falcon by Allen C. last
> week at Fernald (Jill and I dashed over to see if we could find it).
> Additional photos showed up today from its recent return to Fernald [see
> Cincy Hotline for post]. The bird “felt” wrong to me in regards to our
> “typical” [mudblood?] reintroduced anatum peregrines. I think this is an
> immature [1st cycle] tundrius peregrine—strong supercilium, buffy brown,
> narrow face stripe—only vague appearance of a ‘hood’. Underwing linings are
> moderately darker than rest of flight feathers—but dark feathers not
> positioned appropriate for Prairie Falcon. Tundrius individuals breed in the
> high Arctic and winter in Central/South America, take a look, and I would
> love to hear your feedback.
>
> Cheers
>
> Dave
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