Hermit Thrush? - Eastern Ontario, Canada (1 Viewer)

[Gordon W]

Shot this morning in eastern Ontario, Canada, I think this is a hermit thrush, but not positive. Can someone confirm or correct that ID?

 

[nartreb]

Confirmed. Tail redder than back.

 

[Butty]

Tail redder than back.

But also the whole of the upperparts are rather warm brown. Is this OK for eastern hermit thrush, or does this bring veery into the frame? It's a difficult angle, but I would have thought blackish chest-markings of hermit thrush would probably be (just) visible here, and they're not.

Shot this morning in eastern Ontario, Canada

Covers a massive potential area. It's important to know more, please.

 

[nartreb]

does this bring veery into the frame?

Hmmmm.... that does look like a possibility, I agree the cap and overall tone looks rather warm for a hermit. Hard to be super confident without knowing the camera settings, but of course both species are somewhat variable. I still think there's a clear contrast between the tail and the rest, which means it has to be a hermit unless there's something really unusual going on with the lighting.

I can't see enough of the breast to draw any conclusions about breast spotting. Again, both species are variable, you need a good look. You can see a bit of dark spotting under the chin - I'd argue it's too dark for a veery. But another photo would help.

Behavior would help too. Hermits do a lot of tail-wagging, veeries don't.

 

[Gordon W]

Shot 200 km west of Montreal.

The bird gave me only three seconds to get it in the viewfinder, focus, and shoot and then it was gone right after I hit the shutter, so regrettably I had no time for any more shots or to notice behavior.

 

[D Halas]

Hermit Thrush for me – the tail is noticeably redder than the back, and this shouldn't be the case on a Veery. I think the lighting is making the upperparts look much warmer than they would in more neutral lighting.

 

[AveryBartels]

Shorter primary projection (in addition to other comments here) also fit Hermit better than Veery.

 

[KC Foggin]

Hermit Thrush for me

 

[connorco]

Another for Hermit, the facial pattern isn't contrasty enough for VEER as well.