American Golden-Plover? (central Panama) (1 Viewer)

[jcaxel]

Hi, we saw this Golden-Plover with a little flock of Black-bellied Plovers and shorebirds at the Pacific coast in central Panama (southern Central America). Unfortunately, the pics are not good enough to evaluate the wing/tail relations and the primaries projection... otherwise, this plover exhibits marks that are good for either of those (American -dominica- vs Pacific -fulva- Golden-Plovers). Dominica is a quite uncommon migrant through Panama (both coasts), with only few records of over-wintering birds (so not at all unexpected for january). Fulva has never been recorded in Panama (but have been recorded in Galapagos islands and Chile). I posted more photos with discussion at my blog here http://janbirdingblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/veracruz-in-high-tide.html. Thank you for the help.

 

[njlarsen]

To my mind, tail-wing-tertials seems to indicate AM golden. It is easier to explain pale undertail coverts as molt in an AmGP than it is to explain lack of white along the edge of the wing in a PaGP, so my guess is Am GP

Niels