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Dunlin subspecies, Gran Canaria (1 Viewer)

Wiganlad

Well-known member
Firstly, I would like to confirm that these are Dunlin! Taken on 22 August this year in Gran Canaria, Canary Islands. BUT the tricky part is which subspecies are they? They seem dullish with no obvious rusty colour and the bill seems quite long. I would love to have any thoughts.
 

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Any idea about which race? I notice that 'arctica' and 'schinzii' migrate to NW Africa but when I looked at a specialist Swedish website, both of those seemed to have shorter bills and brighter rustiness on the back. Which ones have the longer bills? I haven't been able to find that out.
 
Any idea about which race? I notice that 'arctica' and 'schinzii' migrate to NW Africa but when I looked at a specialist Swedish website, both of those seemed to have shorter bills and brighter rustiness on the back. Which ones have the longer bills? I haven't been able to find that out.

See my edit, others who know a lot more than me will weigh in.

The two longest billed races are both American, pacificus from the West and hudsonia from the East, both should winter in the Americas.


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Try here (especially the last two pages): Everything you always wanted to know about dunlins! ;-)

http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=257917

Any idea about which race? I notice that 'arctica' and 'schinzii' migrate to NW Africa but when I looked at a specialist Swedish website, both of those seemed to have shorter bills and brighter rustiness on the back. Which ones have the longer bills? I haven't been able to find that out.
 
Thank you for replies so far. I went to Fernando's link and wonder whether that suggested my Gran Canaria birds are hudsonia blown over by the various storms this year. Yet when I compare mine to the hudsonia, mine don't have any streaking down the flanks and hudsonia don't seem to have the white egdings to the black markings on the feathers?? But the bills seem identical in length and thickness. Do any of the Eurasian subspecies have such strong bills? Or is the evidence saying mine Canary birds are indeed hudsonia?
 
Thank you for replies so far. I went to Fernando's link and wonder whether that suggested my Gran Canaria birds are hudsonia blown over by the various storms this year. Yet when I compare mine to the hudsonia, mine don't have any streaking down the flanks and hudsonia don't seem to have the white egdings to the black markings on the feathers?? But the bills seem identical in length and thickness. Do any of the Eurasian subspecies have such strong bills? Or is the evidence saying mine Canary birds are indeed hudsonia?

I had three birds in Nottingham in the 90's. The bills were so long and from the distance I saw them, I wrongly reported them as Curlew Sandpipers but the race was never established.

It's not impossible that they could be hudsonia the site I had the Dunlin is where I also found a Buff Breasted Sandpiper.

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I had three birds in Nottingham in the 90's. The bills were so long and from the distance I saw them, I wrongly reported them as Curlew Sandpipiers but the race was never established.

It's not impossible that they could be hudsonia the site I had the Dunlin is where I also found a Buff Breasted Sandpiper.

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I have witnessed this myself to but at such times you can work
Overtime in your mind looking for different features and usually out in the
field its difficult to pick out such features distance wise and not to spook
The bird can be a hell of a combination at times especially when you have
little time to get a id if possible, even with these pictures of the dunlin its
A challenge I,ve just checked through some good guide books and hudsonia
looks the right race but even then some features don,t seem to match up
This can often be the case I find with many birds and of course hybrids
how often do they happen?.
 
A similar question prompted my first post on Bird Forum:
http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=309402

Looking at the pictures I took, if we take as a starting premise mine was just a long-billed alpina, to my eye the bills on yours look significantly longer - so perhaps indeed hudsonia?

In retrospect, I seem to recall that my birds were assigned as 'long-billed' alpina but as you say, the birds in the OP do seem to have longer bills.



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Further Dunlin query

Just to add more to the conundrum, what are these? Taken in Sanibel Island, Florida April 15 2012.
 

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If the default dunlin for Sanibel is hudsonica, these appear if anything to be slightly shorter billed than your Gran Canaria birds, particularly #4 in your original post, which is pictured side-on. Given as I understood it from responses to my own query that there are differences in bill length within a population (between males / females for example), I think it adds weight to your Gran Canaria birds being hudsonica.
 
Lots of evidence in favour of hudsonia for the Canaries birds, although I still hesitate because of the seemingly white, streakfree sides on the Canaries birds compared to other hudsonia.
 
The bill on the canaries bird doesn't look remarkably long to me. Dunlin bills are very variable - and I see several birds that look like this most autumns in the UK.
 
If you go back to the 5 Canary islands pics at the start of the post, then there is a difference between birds 3 and 4 re. bill length....what does that say? Maybe to do with the angle!
 
Could be the angle, could be sex related, could be subspecies related, could be related to individual variation - or of course any combination of the above!
 
The bill on the canaries bird doesn't look remarkably long to me. Dunlin bills are very variable - and I see several birds that look like this most autumns in the UK.
When I was out more in
The field I must admit I saw birds in land on occasions with variable bills its a bit to long ago now thou to remember what times of the year I saw them.
 
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