ID Pls. Common or Pallid Swift - Zonguldak Turkey ( Black Sea ) -3 days ago (1 Viewer)

[kingfisher53]

Bird ID Pls. The photo was recorded 3 days ago near Black Sea side Zonguldak Turkey. Thanks in advance.

 

[HouseCrow]

Pallid based on not so sharp wingtip, eyepatch, brownish, scaly breast... But i have little field experience with Pallid.
Cheers
Gerben


edit: humbled by Alexander's comment below. I should stick to things I know a little bit more of.

 

[Alexander Stöhr]

One of those pictures, where I have an opinion, but I was (and still am unsure), so I hesitate to answer, and waited for others to comment.
I write my thoughts here and hope to be corrected or confirmed:

• I see a slightly browner, but not paler bird here, than most Common Swifts, but still within variation for Common Swift
• Hips are slightly at the broad side for a Common Swift, but Pallid Swifts has long rear-end with still broad hips. This bird here has an overall compact, stocky) shape (even for normal Common Swift)
• Wing tip is still sharp enough to be within variation for Common Swift. I am often surprised about the differences between a view flying Common Swift and pictures of the same bird (as you know, my camera is set to burst modus most times. Sorry here for that!)
• bird lack slight contrasting dark saddle of many Pallids
• small, round pale patch at throat is better for Common Swift (=clearly within variation for Common Swift)
• I dont know, if presence and intensity of a dark eye-mask can be judged here with confidence, but gut feeling is, that this bird is within variation for a Common Swift
• on can get the impression, that tail-fork is too shallow for an ID-book Common Swift. But when you study Common Swifts in the field and on pictures, you will see, that this is so extremly variable and appearantly dependent on posture (and viewing angle in photograph?) , that I have decided to lay not much confidence in this feature, Right or wrong. Dont know?)
• Prominent and clearly whitish scaling is out of variation for an adult Common Swift from central and western Europe (that at best shows what appears to be distinct round moddling of pale feather edges), but I havent experience with eastern ssp. pekinensis,

Yes, all the above mentioned points made me think, that this bird is indeed a Common Swift, and that the strange scaling on the belly can be explained by my lack of experience with eastern birds. But is this right or wrong? As said, this is not a confident identification. I have ssen many Pallid Swifts in Italy, France and Spain before, and I got the feeling, that Pallid Swift(observations) can be devided in two categories:

• birds/observations (or observation circumstances?), where the Pallid Swift is clearly different from a Common Swift by the features covered in field guides present and evident and clearly visible and resulting in a clearly different species against a Common Swift. Therefore resulting in a bird, that I thought that would stand out in a flock of Common Swift in Germany for example and would be easily idable as a Pallid.
• birds/observations (or observation circumstances?) where some/all feautures of a Pallid Swift were there, but hardly visible/judgeable/just slightly different from Common Swift, therefore resulting in a Common Swift with features of a Pallid Swift.

I often got the feeling, that there is not much in between these two categories. So: is the Pallid vs Common Swift an easy or hard ID-challenge?

The above mentioned points can also be regarded as a hope for some more input in identification of this tricky pair. There are some excellent and helpfull ID-articles out there, which helped me gaining my own field experience, but there are still many questions/unsureness about this topic for me. Resason? Dont know. I am undiceded. is there a need for one more paper? Dont know, when reading for example the ID- article in the german birder journal Limicola by Daniel Kratzer, I get the feeling, that everything is covered and finished, but the above raised questions hasnt gone.

 

[tconzemi]

Thanks Alexander for sharing your thoughts, I will do the same:

• wing shape and wing formula are almost impossible to assess in single pictures imho
• colour assesment is also very light dependent and often wrongly reproduced on digital photographs
• size of throat patch surely very important and in pic 1 you can see light feathers below the eye indicating Pallid
• scaling is an important feature but please note that according to Ross Ahmed & Peter Adriaens, scaling regularly occurs in COMMON BUT IN PALLID more prominent on belly and flanks than on undertail-coverts. (Common, Asian Common and Pallid Swift: colour nomenclature, moult and identification January 2010 Dutch Birding 32:97-105). In this bird, scaling in undertail coverts is clearly visible, which is a strong pro-COMMON feature. Photographing a Common Swift breeding colony in southern France a few years ago, I saw several Common Swifts with clear scaling

So I think this is a Common Swift but I am often proven wrong in Swift identification

EDIT: IT IS THE OTHER WAY ROUND! COMPLETELY MISREAD THIS AND CORRECTED THE TEXT
SORRY FOR THIS BUT AS I SAID I AM ALWAYS WRONG WITH SWIFTS, NOW I KNOW WHY (corrected text in italic)

SO THIS INDEED SHOULD BE A COMMON SWIFT

 

[Butty]

scaling regularly occurs in COMMON BUT IN PALLID more prominent on belly and flanks than on undertail-coverts. ... In this bird, scaling in undertail coverts is clearly visible, which is a strong pro-COMMON feature.

Am confused! Did you do all your text-correcting correctly, Tom?!
This bird does show scaling more prominent on belly and flanks than on undertail-coverts - surely? - in fact I would say that scaling is barely visible at all on the undertail-coverts. Which (from what you've said of this ID feature), surely implies pallid?

 

[tconzemi]

Am confused! Did you do all your text-correcting correctly, Tom?!
This bird does show scaling more prominent on belly and flanks than on undertail-coverts - surely? - in fact I would say that scaling is barely visible at all on the undertail-coverts. Which (from what you've said of this ID feature), surely implies pallid?

Imho scaling is quite prominent on central belly (in the shadow), and don’t forget my second statement: I’m always wrong with swifts

 

[Butty]

scaling is quite prominent on central belly (in the shadow)

Definitely. But I took it, from what you say, that this ID criterion is about the difference between scaling on belly/flanks and scaling on undertail-coverts - and scaling is, on this bird, more prominent on belly/flanks than on undertail-coverts. Thus this criterion indicates the bird is pallid swift. Or am I misunderstanding?
(Just checking... We are both reading these photos as showing 1 = upperside and 2 = underside? So we're looking at pic 2 only for this belly/scaling feature??)

 

[tconzemi]

Definitely. But I took it, from what you say, that this ID criterion is about the difference between scaling on belly/flanks and scaling on undertail-coverts - and scaling is, on this bird, more prominent on belly/flanks than on undertail-coverts. Thus this criterion indicates the bird is pallid swift. Or am I misunderstanding?
(Just checking... We are both reading these photos as showing 1 = upperside and 2 = underside? So we're looking at pic 2 only for this belly/scaling feature??)

Yes 1= upperside, and it seems that Pallid has almost no scaling at UTC

 

[tconzemi]

Initial paper cited above:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/318600344_Common_Asian_Common_and_Pallid_Swift_colour_nomenclature_moult_and_identification

putting pekinensis into the game:

(PDF) Roberts, H & Campbell, O (2015). Proving the occurrence of Common Swift Apus apus pekinensis in the United Arab Emirates.

PDF | On Jan 1, 2015, Huw Roberts and others published Roberts, H & Campbell, O (2015). Proving the occurrence of Common Swift Apus apus pekinensis in the United Arab Emirates. | Find, read and cite all the research you need on ResearchGate

www.researchgate.net

 

[Butty]

Yes 1= upperside, and it seems that Pallid has almost no scaling at UTC

I'm still confused... You said above that the criterion refers to undertail-coverts. Hence, for this, we should be looking only at pic 2 - and at the difference between scaling on belly v. undertail-coverts - which (on that criterion) makes it pallid swift.

 

[Butty]

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/318600344_Common_Asian_Common_and_Pallid_Swift_colour_nomenclature_moult_and_identification

'Both pallidus and apus show some degree of scaling on underparts, at all ages. However, in pallidus, the scaling is most prominent on the belly and flanks, and less so on the undertail-coverts, while the opposite is usually true in apus (including pekinensis). This difference is often readily visible in photographs and it is surprising that it has not been described like this in literature before.'

If this is a good solid feature, the OP's bird is a pallid swift.

 

[tconzemi]

Life is so easy when you are out on the field and speaking to each other, I meant yes pic 1 is upperside, so we definitely have to look at pic 2 for the UTC

 

[tconzemi]

enhanced pic which would confirm Butty is right with Pallid and me too (stating I'm always wrong)