Terry O'Nolley
Cow-headed Jaybird
I was at a new local patch yesterday and was amazed by all of the activity there.
I saw a bird fly past me that was a very bright blue color. It wan't the irridescent blue of Grackles or Starlings - it was the bright blue of a Blue Jay but this bird was sparrow-sized at the largest.
It's wings beat very fast and continuously and it flew in an undulating manner.
When I used to think of undulating flight, I thought of the type of undulation where each wingbeat, or perhaps 2 wingbeats, produce the up arc and the bird coasted for the down arc. Well this bird beat its wings very rapidly and continuously as it undulated up and down.
Its wings were moving too fast for me to tell anything at all about their coloring. They looked like a grey blur and I saw it mainly from slightly above and to the side. It was flying very low over an open field from one tree line to the next and passed within 20 feet of me at the closest point. It landed on an exposed branch on a tall tree but flew off before I could get close enough for a look.
The only mainly blue birds in this area that are that size are Indigo and Lazuli Buntings and Cerulean and Black-throated Blue Warblers and its size was small so I am leaning towards a warbler.
I am certainly not going to tick a bird based on this, but, to better prepare me for what to look for next time, can the bird I saw be narrowed down by the flight characteristics I detailed?
I saw a bird fly past me that was a very bright blue color. It wan't the irridescent blue of Grackles or Starlings - it was the bright blue of a Blue Jay but this bird was sparrow-sized at the largest.
It's wings beat very fast and continuously and it flew in an undulating manner.
When I used to think of undulating flight, I thought of the type of undulation where each wingbeat, or perhaps 2 wingbeats, produce the up arc and the bird coasted for the down arc. Well this bird beat its wings very rapidly and continuously as it undulated up and down.
Its wings were moving too fast for me to tell anything at all about their coloring. They looked like a grey blur and I saw it mainly from slightly above and to the side. It was flying very low over an open field from one tree line to the next and passed within 20 feet of me at the closest point. It landed on an exposed branch on a tall tree but flew off before I could get close enough for a look.
The only mainly blue birds in this area that are that size are Indigo and Lazuli Buntings and Cerulean and Black-throated Blue Warblers and its size was small so I am leaning towards a warbler.
I am certainly not going to tick a bird based on this, but, to better prepare me for what to look for next time, can the bird I saw be narrowed down by the flight characteristics I detailed?