ID of eastern Reed and Pallas’s Buntings (1 Viewer)

[Julian H]

This is an old post from Mike Kilburn from 2019. Can anyone expound on why these are Pallas’s rather than Eastern Reed. I ask due to some confusion around a bird I had in Nepal and some of the field characters between these two overlap tremendously that call is likely needed on some birds. Curious to know since these show greyish lower mandibles like Reed while other Eastern races (pallidior/parvirostris) can show tiny bills with some pale pink in the lower mandible. It sees a lot more difficult to ID these than the literature would suggest.

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I photographed these two birds almost a month apart in November 2018 on my San Tin Fishponds patch in Hong Kong.

Pallas's Reed Bunting is a description species in Hong Kong, so when I looked closely and noted the difference in tertials between the two birds I thought I'd ask for any thoughts from those more familiar with moult in buntings and with Pallas's Reed Bunting in particular.

DSC02217 was taken on 4th Nov
DSC02740 was taken on 30th Nov

Thanks in advance of any thoughts.

Cheers
Mike

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  DSC02217 Pallas's Reed Bunting @ San Tin.jpg
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[NickBrown]

Firstly the pale, unstreaked rump is always a good sign for Pallas. Can't quite see the lesser coverts, which is annoying, but overall lack of rufous in the wing is a pro-Pallas sign, these birds also have very defined white wing bars. There are also large buff lines in the mantle as well as large buff fringes to the tertials.

 

[Bismarck Honeyeater]

I’m sure I read, probably in the Birding World article, which I no longer have. Eastern RB have a convex, curved, bulging bill. Not sure if that’s all races though.

 

[MKinHK]

Delighted to see this issue pop up again Julian.

Do you have any pix of these small grey lower-billed Red Buntings? I'd be really interested to see them.

Cheers
Mike