Unstreaked acro - Hong Kong 20 Jan 2019 (1 Viewer)

Very interested in thoughts on this acrocephalus warbler I found yesterday on my patch at San Tin fishponds in Hong Kong.

Initial thoughts were Blunt-winged Warbler (rare winter visitor), based on the long bill and short primary projection in the back-on shot, and when I explained the dark lateral crown stripe was NOT photo artefact, but also clearly seen in the field Manchurian came into consideration.

Manchurian, Paddyfield, Blunt-winged and Blyth's are all rare winter visitors and Black-browed Reed Warbler is the default acro - and there were several on site.


Cheers
Mike

MKinHK said:

Very interested in thoughts on this acrocephalus warbler I found yesterday on my patch at San Tin fishponds in Hong Kong.

Initial thoughts were Blunt-winged Warbler (rare winter visitor), based on the long bill and short primary projection in the back-on shot, and when I explained the dark lateral crown stripe was NOT photo artefact, but also clearly seen in the field Manchurian came into consideration.

Manchurian, Paddyfield, Blunt-winged and Blyth's are all rare winter visitors and Black-browed Reed Warbler is the default acro - and there were several on site.

Cheers
Mike

Click to expand...

images Mike?

Grahame

From the images supplied, one might be forgiven for considering Paddyfield Warbler as a contender?

Cheers

Grahame Walbridge said:

images Mike?

Grahame

Click to expand...

Apologies Grahame - now posted

Mike

KenM said:

From the images supplied, one might be forgiven for considering Paddyfield Warbler as a contender?

Cheers

Click to expand...

I should have thought combination of very short TF1 (see 1st & 3rd images) + rather long bill lacking dark tip eliminate Paddyfield which, leaves Manchurian or Blunt-winged. Based solely on face/head pattern I'd favour the latter but with a degree of caution in the absence of better quality images.

Grahame

Grahame Walbridge said:

I should have thought combination of very short TF1 (see 1st & 3rd images) + rather long bill lacking dark tip eliminate Paddyfield which, leaves Manchurian or Blunt-winged. Based solely on face/head pattern I'd favour the latter but with a degree of caution in the absence of better quality images.

Grahame

Click to expand...

After now looking at images of the candidates suggested, I agree that perhaps Paddyfield might be the weakest consideration, however I would find it difficult to eliminate Manchurian Reed Warbler on these images, as the contrasting pale edges to the tertials seem to be a good feature? Better images would certainly help.

Cheers

superc reached behind eye, seems darker above the superc, seems to have a buffish breast and flanks, short wing - I think it is an manchurian reed warbler

I have lightened up one and cropped of the pics for you to make it bigger and easier to look at.

The head pattern (especially shape of the super and black on sides of crown), large bill with fully pale lower mandible and short wings/longish tail all suggest Manchurian to me.

Many thanks for your input gents - very helpful.

Like Ken my first thought was Paddyfield, but fully accept that the long bill with an all-pale lower mandible knocks it out of the reckoning, and indeed the dark lateral crown stripe is big for a Paddyfield, while certainly being wrong for Black-browed.

It also looks like it has too much super for Blunt-winged although some pictures in this very interesting article on acros in Thailand suggest Blunt-winged can show some contrast behind the eye.

Grahame - could I ask what about the head pattern suggested Blunt-winged?

One of my Hong Kong birding mates noted the pale esge to the ear coverts in pic 4, which also appears in some of the pix in Reed and Bush Warblers

My apologies for the quality of the images - a combination of shooting at distance and the losses in resizing for BF. I’ll see if I can produce something better at lunchtime from the originals.

Cheers
Mike

Just a silly typo Mike, I meant to say the FORMER (Manchurian) which it clearly is on seeing the additional image posted!

Grahame

Many thanks for the clarification Grahame - a pleasing consensus is developing . . .

Here's a couple more pix, the first of which is new. Not sure there's much improvement.

Another good resource is this paper by Paul Leader and Peter Kennerley in the 1991 Hong Kong Bird Report. It starts on page 143.


Cheers
Mike

And another good resource from Ayuwat's excellent blog https://ayuwat.wordpress.com

Grahame

By way of background, confirming this bird as Manchurian Reed Warbler caps a truly outstanding weekend on my patch.

I have checked out every one of somewhere between 500 and 1000 bird-days worth of Black-browed Reed Warblers looking for something more interesting since September last year - so this is a very sweet reward - long after the peak passage for Manchurian has ended! Even better, it's my first in the field and a patch tick.

In fact the Manchurian was the third lightning strike, as I also found but only had one-second views of a much plainer-headed Blunt-winged Warbler (although I did obtain a happily diagnostic recording) on Saturday. This impossibly skulking bird is almost always found in mist nets and has not to my recollection been twitchable for 25 years since I dipped one at almost exactly the same spot as the Manchurian appeared in - so it was a overlong-awaited Hong Kong tick! In fact I only found the Manchurian because I was going back to extend my wait for a second view of the Blunt-winged to over five hours!

The bird that kicked off this amazing weekend was a female Barred Cuckoo Dove eating mouldy bread on the edge of one of the fishponds. There are less than ten previous records in Hong Kong - and such an aristocratically elegant forest dweller has absolutely no business to be debasing itself in such a manner! Had the same bird not been seen by Paul Leader drinking from a shaded pool in the adjoining reserve a few weeks ago, the sight of this beautiful long-necked and long-tailed pigeon flying across a pond filled with 600+ Tufted Ducks would have completely blown my mind!

I guess it wouldn't have mattered if it had - the two acros completed the blow out in any case!

Many thanks to all you for your comments and discussion.

Cheers
Mike

Well done Mike a great find....an amazing position to find oneself, being confronted with a number of options...with all confusion species being rare!

No substitute for graft.:t:

Mike, re your Blunt-winged Warbler, there are only 3 recordings (1 call) on xeno-canto so I'd suggest uploading it there.

Grahame

I certainly plan to do so Grahame as that single recording of the call was the one that opened my mind to the possibility of Blunt-winged - and the recorder - Jonathan Martinez - is a friend, who helped to confirm the ID.

A few biggies have got away over the years Ken, so its very nice to nail three out of three this time!

Cheers
Mike