Diver - Yellow-billed or Great northern, Denmark 04/04/2024 (1 Viewer)

[Louis K. Poulsen]

Hi, I just had this great diver sp. during the morning observation. Personally, I believe it's a Yellow-billed diver, but I would appreciate hearing someone else's opinion
Best regards Louis P.

 

[Butty]

I believe it's a Yellow-billed diver

Why?
Welcome to BF.

 

[Andrew Whitehouse]

The neck pattern (diffuse with no clear cut black and white contrast and no obvious collar) and the apparent uptilted shape of the bill support White-billed Diver (or Yellow-billed if you prefer).

You may find this thread of interest:

Diver, Fife Ness, Scotland 13/10/14

While doing a spot of sea-watching earlier this week at Fife Ness, I spotted this Diver. I suspect it is most likely a moulting Great Northern but I'm not 100% sure as the photos aren't particularly great. I can usually see the bill on Red Throated against the sea no matter the conditions but...

www.birdforum.net

 

[Butty]

neck pattern (diffuse with no clear cut black and white contrast and no obvious collar) and the apparent uptilted shape of the bill

Given the low quality of the photos (no offence to the OP) I believe it unsafe to draw these conclusions.

 

[Andrew Whitehouse]

Given the low quality of the photos (no offence to the OP) I believe it unsafe to draw these conclusions.

Perhaps on their own that might be the case but if the photos are supported by in-field observations (i.e. to demonstrate that the apparent features in the photos were really visible in the field) then I think they are very helpful.

 

[Butty]

the apparent features in the photos

Are they apparent? I see a pattern on fore-neck and side of neck which is essentially mushy and could easily be consistent with great northern diver, a hindneck which is (at least) as dark as the upperwing which thus seems better for great northern diver than for white-billed diver, and an uptilted-looking bill in one photo out of four - an effect which could easily be created by the accidental arrangement of pixels in that one (sorry, low-quality) photo. It may indeed be, of course, that the OP spent more time looking through bins/scope than through camera as it flew past and has good field notes to confirm the suggested ID 👍🏻

 

[Louis K. Poulsen]

Thanks for all comments - in field my first impresion was GND, i didnt look at it in the scope for that long, focused on getting picture (i know that its bad but), but for the short time that i had it in the scope, the bill didnt looked really bright/white/ivory like i would expect from a yellow billed even though it was cloudy. It was first when i looked at the pictures where the bill is "tilting up" that i thought that it had to be a YBD then. But looking closer at the pictures i think it might just be some "accidental arrangement of pixels" as Butty also mentioned, cause i think actually that most other things fits best on GND - I have atached all images below.