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Calls of American Golden Plover v Pacific (1 Viewer)

Jane Turner

Well-known member
So now I have the hang of this site...a new and harder question.

I was out birding the other day and heard a disyllabic “chew…wit” call, which I took to be a Spotted Redshank coming from the north of me. Spotted Redshank is less than annual at my local patch, so I was particularly keen to see it. Looking north I immediately picked up a wader flying directly towards me from the direction of Formby. I was confused to see a plover with a very prominent supercilium. I assumed it was a Dotterel, despite its greyness, was in the process of mentally congratulating myself on recording two excellent wader species when it called again. Clearly it wasn’t a Spot Red and it certainly wasn’t a Dotterel. By now things were starting to fall into place in my head and I realised that this was most likely a Lesser Golden Plover. As it flew towards me and then across me and down the Dee I made sure to check out the features that I could recall for the species pair. I was able to see the underparts very clearly and in excellent light and shortly afterwards I was able to see the upperparts just as clearly, though slightly further away. I phoned a birding friend just in case he was in West Kirby that day but he answered from Hilbre. I was still watching the bird, now over West Kirby Marine Lake and talking to Steve on the phone, when another birder came to join me. He had heard what he had assumed to be a Spotted Redshank, but had not been in a position to see the bird. It carried on south, down the Dee Estuary and was not seen again.

Description
Structure, size, jizz: Seemed slightly smaller (slimmer) than Golden Plover and definitely more ‘wingy’. I was looking for projecting legs/feet as I recalled that this was a feature of one of the species. The bird was only about 40ft away and at my height as it passed to my west. I was able to see the feet quite clearly and am 100% certain that they were no longer than the square-ended tail. It was not possible to see them from above.

Soft Parts. The legs appeared black, as did the bill, which seemed to be similar in proportions to that of a Golden Plover, hence finer than that of Grey Plover. The eye was large and dark and stood out on the face.

Upperparts: The bird appeared to have a darker cap, reminiscent of Dotterel. The flight feathers were dark blackish-brown which contrasted with the wing coverts, back, rump and mantle. These had spangling like a Golden Plover, except there was far less warm tones present. In fact the effect was much more like a dark-rumped and wing-bar-less gingery, juvenile Grey Plover than Golden Plover. I was not looking specifically for a wing bar on the upperwing. If one was present it was certainly not prominent

Underparts: To a first approximation the underparts were grey, though the vent and the lower belly, were white. The underwing was pretty uniformly grey except for some whitish shafts/bases on the primaries, which contrasted with the rest of the underwing, but stood out less prominently than e.g. a juvenile Long-tailed Skua. The throat breast and flanks were also grey, but appeared less uniform than the underwing coverts, perhaps mottled or barred. The strongest feature on the head was the greyish-white supercilium. There was no eyestripe, since I could see the eye standing out, but there did appear to be a darker patch to the rear of the ear coverts.

The greyness and lack of trailing legs point towards Yankee. The call ought to be a clincher, but there is really mixed messages in the literature. If only the thing had landed!
 
Hi Jane,
Interesting!There was an AGP at Ballycotton this Sep(which I didn't see myself):it was only seen on the deck by 3-4 birders,who all agreed that it was American,but a few who saw it in flight thought that it sounded like Spotted Redshank(more associated with descriptions of Pacific's call).
Despite seeing two AGP's(one of which was controversial at the time but later clinched as American),I have only heard the species call once,and that was more of a contact call to a Goldie that flew over than anything else!
Sounds like an American to me!
Harry H
 
Hi Jane
from what i have been able to look up, the ch-wit/ch-weet call of American may have more of a rising tone. Other than that the others calls seem to probably overlap
 
Au contraire... this was 100% not a EGP... just not 100% not PGP! Oh for even 2 seconds of it on the deck!

Unhelpfully Lars Johnsson states call a disgnostic sharp, Spotted Redshank-like "chuwit" forfulva!
 
Never knowingly heard either AGP or PGP call. It's a bit difficult when they're in the middle of 2,000 EGP all yakking away at each other . . . .

Michael
 
Hi all'

For what it's worth; the times when I have been in Europe puzzling over calls, Jonssons transcriptions of calls have seemed very accurate.

Andy.
 
Hi Jane,
For what it is worth, I've never heard Pacific Goldie, but I have heard a few American and they sound very much like Spotted Redshank. I did just the same as you once - picked one up on call and thought it was Spotted Redshank, luckily we got it later on the deck.

Darrell
 
This is the sketch I made at the scene... managed to make it tubbier than it was!

The really annoying thing is that this is the second flying only Lesser Goldie I've had here.... I've also had a flying Yellowlegs, presumerd Lesser, the day before one turned up at Marshside and wintered!
 

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