Series of 'Isabelline' Shrikes - 08-15.04.17 - Kuwait (1 Viewer)

[Paul Chapman]

A series of ‘Isabelline’ Shrikes from Kuwait between 8th and 15th April on which I would be grateful for people’s thoughts. I am far from convinced on some of my identifications. All are different birds (I believe):-
1. 08.04.17 – Pivot Fields – female Turkestan?
2. 08.04.17 – Pivot Fields – male Daurian?
3. 09.04.17 – Al Khiran – male Turkestan?
4. 09.04.17 – Al Khiran – female Turkestan?
5. 09.04.17 – Al Khiran – male Turkestan?

Many thanks

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

6. 09.04.17 – Al Khiran – male ‘karelini’ Turkestan?
7. 10.04.17 – Jahra Pools – female Daurian?
8. 11.04.17 – Al Liyah – found dead – male Daurian?
9. 11.04.17 – Al Liyah – female Daurian?
10. 11.04.17 – Jahra Pools – male Turkestan?

Many thanks

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

11. 13.04.17 – KABD - female Daurian?
12. 13.04.17 – KABD – male Turkestan?
13. 13.04.17 – Al Liyah – female Daurian?
14. 14.04.17 – Al-Shaheed Park – male Turkestan?
15. 14.04.17 – KABD – male Daurian?

Many thanks

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

Final one:-
16. 15.04.17 – Jahra Pools – female Daurian?

Many thanks

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

Just to bump this thread - even confirmation or contradiction on the 'obvious' ones I would find really helpful....

 

[dantheman]

Don't know,and not going to comment myself.

Might have made sense (for ease of comparison, and as a future birding resource) to group the proposed 'same' birds together eg all the 'male Daurian' , then the 'male Turkestan' etc etc ?

 

[tconzemi]

I would agree with most but
8 dead female rather than male Turkestan
7 and 11 are difficult, let's wait for Grahame and Brian, I'll bump it up again when I see them online

 

[Tib78]

I would agree with most too, although i would passon sexing quite a few of these (not always as easy as it seems).
I would call 7 a female Turkestan based on the tone of the upperparts and very dark ear-patch. 11 looks really difficult from that angle but possibly another Turkestan.

I attached what I would call a typical female Daurian, seen recently on wintering grounds: creamy tones overall and not much contrast between upper and underparts, rather pale ear-patch.

 

[Brian J Small]

Paul

An illuminating series of photos that illustrate nicely the problems faced in identifying 'isabelline' shrikes. Most of these are down to light and photographic artefact.

For example image 7 (female 'Daurian') suffers badly from dusty yellow Kuwait light. Once you remove this (or at least change it) you can see that it does in fact have a more rufous crown and I would put it down as fm Turkestan. See attached image with adjusted on left.

11 is also a tough one and the lack of strong colour below and warm wash on fore-crown may hint at Turkestan.

Any others you would like to share?

Brian

 

[Paul Chapman]

Tom, Tib78 and Brian - thank you. This is exceptionally helpful. I will review and post any additional photos of the females when I get home tonight.

Dantheman - I will group as you suggest.

I'll then try and have a look at my 'Lesser Whitethroats'....

All the best

 

[Paul Chapman]

Grouping of five male Turkestans:-

3. 09.04.17 – Al Khiran – male Turkestan
5. 09.04.17 – Al Khiran – male Turkestan
10. 11.04.17 – Jahra Pools – male Turkestan
12. 13.04.17 – KABD – male Turkestan
14. 14.04.17 – Al-Shaheed Park – male Turkestan

All the best

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

6. 09.04.17 – Al Khiran – male ‘karelini’ Turkestan

All the best

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

Grouping of two female Turkestan

1. 08.04.17 – Pivot Fields – female Turkestan
4. 09.04.17 – Al Khiran – female Turkestan

All the best

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

Grouping of two male Daurian

2. 08.04.17 – Pivot Fields – male Daurian
15. 14.04.17 – KABD – male Daurian

All the best

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

Grouping of four female Daurian

8. 11.04.17 – Al Liyah – found dead – female Daurian
9. 11.04.17 – Al Liyah – female Daurian
13. 13.04.17 – Al Liyah – female Daurian
16. 15.04.17 – Jahra Pools – female Daurian

All the best

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

Turkestan/Daurian female - additional photos?

7. 10.04.17 – Jahra Pools

All the best

Paul

 

[Paul Chapman]

Turkestan/Daurian female - additional photos?

11. 13.04.17 – KABD

All the best

Paul

 

[andyb39]

Paul,

Have you looked at this article? It's rather dated but has useful information on distribution, and the plate on p.8 (Figure 3) might be useful.

https://www.dutchbirding.nl/journal/pdf/DB_2000_22_6.pdf

Brian Small's paper on Surfbirds was partly based on it:

https://www.surfbirds.com/ID Articles/Isabelline.html

Brian, has much changed since then?

The first thing to note is that, while both papers correctly point out that female Daurian is similar to the male, I don't think it's usually as heavily barred as the illustration in Figure 3. Image no.34 is a nice example:

https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-5FQX6/i-8KPVdtt

I wouldn't worry too much about sexing them if I were you!

However, female Turkestan looks very different to the male, although perhaps not quite how it does in the plate. Images 4 (perhaps an immature bird?) 5, 30 and 57 are examples of spring birds.

https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-hkr6H/i-9Vg6h64

Lastly, these birds can be difficult, even in spring. The large number of images in this folder, which could not safely be assigned to either species (even by experienced observers), is evidence of that.

https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-QLNcm/

 

[Brian J Small]

Lastly, these birds can be difficult, even in spring. The large number of images in this folder, which could not safely be assigned to either species (even by experienced observers), is evidence of that.

https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-QLNcm/

Again, and I seem to sound like a stuck record here, a number of the difficulties with these arise due to exposure problems...and one or two are hybrids between Red-backed and Turkestan.

B

 

[Paul Chapman]

Andy/Brian - thank you very much. A bit more reading tonight and then it is definitely time to look at the 'Lesser Whitethroats'.

(My inclination is 7 as Turkestan and 11 as Daurian but all limitations noted.)

Very many thanks all