stonechat eyebrow (1 Viewer)

E

erwin

Well-known member

• Sep 18, 2003

• #1

Hi,
Great forum you guys have, learn something from it every day.

Last monday I got confused by a stonechat which seemed to have an "abnormal" eyebrow stripe. After checking my 3 guides, my best guess is an adult female common stonechat, with an aberrant stripe similar to the Asian race. Any ideas about individual differences / races?

The individual seemed to hang out with a small group of winchats, in a grassland/wetland environment. (Schelde valley north of Ghent, Belgium)

Erwin

 

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Andy Bright

Administrator

Staff member

• Sep 18, 2003

• #2

Hi Erwin, sorry I can't offer any help on this bird but I can say a big welcome to birdforum from all the moderators and admin here. We hope you enjoy yourself at BF.

I'm sure someone will be along any moment now to offer something constructive.

Regards,
Andy@birdforum

 

CJW

Hit-and-run WUM

• Sep 18, 2003

• #3

My guess would be a rubicolis race female - the extent of the underparts colouring would certainly fit.
What was the rump pattern like?

 

CJW

Hit-and-run WUM

• Sep 18, 2003

• #4

Oops sorry Erwin, I didn't notice it was your first posting - welcome, you've come to the right place (there's some pretty hot guys on here - at i.d. that is).

 

Michael Frankis

conehead

• Sep 18, 2003

• #5

Hi Erwin,

Welcome to BF!

I'd agree with female European Stonechat. I've seen one or two very similar to this in autumn in northeast England, and they (as CJ suggests) were also thought to be the central European race rubicola (as opposed to the western race hibernans, which breeds locally)

In theory, your resident Stonechats in Belgium should all be rubicola, but that and hibernans intergrade freely, so maybe your resident ones also show some hibernans characters.

Michael

 

E

erwin

Well-known member

• Sep 18, 2003

• #6

Andy and CJW, thanks for the warm welcome.

About the back: Only thing I remember is that it was mostly brown (significantly darker then the winchats), with one light wing patch. I know, I should also have taken notes in addition to pictures. But I thought I was going to sort it out easily at home with the pictures.

Erwin

 

Larry Lade

Moderator

• Sep 18, 2003

• #7

I have no familiarity with this species, but I could not help noticing how light and shadow can give different impressions of a bird. See how the top photos seem to indicate a dark/mottled throat. The bottom row of photos give the impression that the bird has a white throat. If a person had just one photo to look at this might be a field mark which would sway the identification process!

Larry

 

E

erwin

Well-known member

• Sep 19, 2003

• #8

Hi Michael,

Thanks for the response.
Is the eyebrow stripe typical for the rubicola race, in comparison to hibernans? Maybe my field guides (Jonsson, Heinzel 2e edition, Harris Tucker) show the hibernans?
These birds are not that common in my region, it's been a while since I've seen one in winter plumage, espescially since my birdwatching has been on a low fire for a while. (But it's revived now thanks to digiscoping)

Larry, that's why I showed all 6 shots I have. The sun was very low and my cp995 can be tricky to blow out highlights.

 

Michael Frankis

conehead

• Sep 19, 2003

• #9

Hi Erwin,

Sorry, I don't know if a supercilium like this is typical of all rubicola, or just some, either regionally or as within-population variability. I'm just wishing I'd spent a bit more time to get a close look at the Stonechats I saw in Bulgaria, they were 200m away across the other side of a marsh so about all I did was note their presence for my Bulgaria list.

Looking at the breeding distribution again, I'd suspect most if not all of the Belgian breeding Stonechats are hibernans, as they are clearly part of a linked population, with a wide gap in the breeding range across Germany to where rubicola breeds in Poland southward. Presumably intergrades in south & central France. There isn't much agreement in the literature as to where the divide between the two races is, some say hibernans in Ireland only, others say Ireland, Britain, western France, western Spain. Some even say that the range of individual variation within populations is so large that maintaining hibernans as a distinct race at all is barely justified.

Michael

 

L

logos

Well-known member

• Sep 19, 2003

• #10

The differences between most hibernans and most rubicola are so subtle that individuals cannot be identified to race even in the hand. Certain described plumage traits represent small average differences only and some birds from either end of the spectrum of variation probably match certain individuls from the opposite end.

On this basis I'd wholeheartedly agree that hibernans is an invalid race. Although some birds might appear that seem distinct enough to be rubicola, this can never be proven, most are inseperble and nothing is really gained by recording either. Those striking apparent male rubicola that do occasionally turn up are liable to be confused with Siberian maura. All of the subtle and inconsitent plumage traits which might be used to suspect a rubicola over a hibernans in the UK are small steps towards the appearance of maura but almost all can be occasionally found in breeding hibernans in Britain too.

Spud

 

CJW

Hit-and-run WUM

• Sep 19, 2003

• #11

Remarkably, I agree with Spud on this one!
Below are some notes on a bird that we had here on the IOM for a couple of hours in September 2001. It arrived during a bit of a fall from the continent of Robins etc. What the sketches don't mention is that the rump did have some small amount of streaking, particularly on the edges. We considered it to be a rubicola race at the time, but perhaps it wasn't?

 

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Surreybirder

Ken Noble

• Sep 19, 2003

• #12

In my experience, it's not unusual to see some trace of a pale supercilium on female/immature stonechats... even though many of the field guides emphasise that (British ones) don't have a supercilium.