Warblers, France- Charente, 05/06/2023 (1 Viewer)

[Bewick]

It's a scruffy juvenile Chiffchaff (this plumage is quickly moulted out) imo.
Western Bonelli's is actually one of the species I most frequently see in 'summer' here, and this one isn't one.


I'll leave that for you to find out.

No offence but might you be slightly more specific with the leg and face differences. I’ve looked at images and still don’t see what makes it more likely to be a chiffchaff. Not quite sure what makes it a fledgling either.

 

[RafaelMatias]

I'll try to sum up a few important features then (but I'll not engage in lengthy discussions on ID, sorry):

• bill extensively orange/yellow basally (this is very unlike WBW, lower mandible pinkish)
• face pattern differing from WBW in broken eye-ring anteriorly (WBW has complete, thin, white eye-ring, and much less contrast between the greyish plumage and white)
• head extensively tinged green on crown (pale grey on WBW)
• mantle extensively greenish, contrasting strongly with more greyish head (totally at odds with WBW)
• no contrastingly pale tertial edges on this bird
• underparts not really silky white, they're dirty white, and scruffy looking; even in birds (WBW) with wet plumage this feature shows differently, despite some WBW being a bit less clean than expected (see photos below)

It's conceivable that some individuals in a given species show one or 2 features that are atypical of the species, but this individual has lots.

Some (great) photos from Pedro Marques below:

https://flic.kr/p/2otBoZH

https://flic.kr/p/2otHW4S

https://flic.kr/p/2nePtqr

https://flic.kr/p/2j1muFT

https://flic.kr/p/257fEMd

Felosa-de-bonelli
Felosa-de-bonelli
Felosa-de-bonelli
Felosa-de-bonelli

 

[Butty]

I'll leave that for you to find out.

Nice. Helpful.
But thanks for then recanting and being actually helpful. It's appreciated 👍🏻

 

[Alexander Stöhr]

Thanks from me too Rafael! Excellent and very helpful!

Two young Common Chiffchaffs for comparison:

https://flic.kr/p/2oFLYv8

(17.07.2012, Schwetzinger Wiesen, SW-Germany)

 

[01101001]

@Bewick I think that if you upload photos one by one, waiting until a given picture fully loads before you deal with the next one, there's a chance that the order will be about right.

 

[Bewick]

@Bewick I think that if you upload photos one by one, waiting until a given picture fully loads before you deal with the next one, there's a chance that the order will be about right.

Possibly, that does make sense.

 

[Butty]

I think that if you upload photos one by one, waiting until . . .

Are you talking about the random reordering of photos that takes place sometime after uploading when there's more than 5-6 of them? I don't think that's the issue: it happens too consistently, and does seem to be a long-standing bug in this website which has been mentioned many times in this forum.

 

[01101001]

I tried to be as tentative as possible--I think it's never happened to me after I started doing this, but I don't post many things at once the way I used to, and I might be lacking feedback from others.