Possible Siberian Chiffchaff in Cyprus (1 Viewer)

A friend of mine has asked me to hepl in confirming the ID of a Chiffchaff seen at a habitat with river and reeds in Cyprus, yesterday 18 november.
He says it seemed different in some way from the nominate chiffchaff ph.collybita. He said that it might also have made a call slightly different than that of the common chiffchaff.
Please see the photos taken in the below link:
http://biodiversitycyprus.blogspot.com.cy/2015/11/siberian-chiffchaff-phylloscopus.html

My personal view is that the bird does not match the features of a Siberian Chiffchaff, especially colour of bill and legs, and face side.

Nevertheless, if you look at the individual displaying 'fulvescens' traits in this link - http://deanar.org.uk/tristis/tristis.htm you might see a large degree of similarity.

I have no experience with Siberian Chiffchaff and I can not be sure, and thus am kindly asking for opinions from people having at least some experience with Siberian Chiffchaff.

looks more like a fulvescens if it even is an eastern one. call would have been very important.

My suggestion would be to submit it to the rarities committee at Cyprus BirdLife for their opinion but I suspect it will be left in the undecided box!


Shane

lou salomon said:

looks more like a fulvescens if it even is an eastern one. call would have been very important.

Click to expand...

Vocalisations of 'fulvescens' do not differ from core tristis as far as I am aware.

There are certainly some strong olive tones showing in the scapulars but there are none visible in the mantle. Also, in the second image, there appears be yellow in the fore supercilium which would indicate its from the western part of the range='fulvescens', assuming that is, it is an 'Eastern' Chiffchaff.

I don't know how Cyprus Birdlife treat 'fulvescens' but would suggest it is worth submitting the record along the lines suggested by Shane. FWIW I agree it is likely to be 'unproven' based on these images alone.

It is always worth taking field-notes in support of any images because the images may not be a true representation of how the bird looked 'in life'; we all know how digital images can 'alter' colours.

Grahame

graham, i meant, call would be a strong pointer towards an eastern (central asian) bird in general, separating it from a nominate collybita or maybe abietinus, not that fulvescens differs from tristis. i.e., i'm not sure an european bird can be excluded based on these pics.

lou salomon said:

graham, i meant, call would be a strong pointer towards an eastern (central asian) bird in general, separating it from a nominate collybita or maybe abietinus, not that fulvescens differs from tristis. i.e., i'm not sure an european bird can be excluded based on these pics.

Click to expand...

Lou,

Sorry, mis-read your post. Based on these images alone I would concur with your conclusions.

Grahame

no need to be sorry, my post probably was ambigous in its briefness. sorry for that

I would like to thank all of you for your most well appreciated comments.
Shane, I have already made the sighting known to someone in the relevant committee of Birdlife Cyprus.
The friend that made the sighting does regret to admit that he should have given greater attention to the call. Thing is he had his attention diverted to a very rare pair of birds in Cyprus - a pair of Bearded reedlings, so this chiffchaff was only somthing of a "side dish" I might say.

Best wishes to all.