July Photo Quiz – Tails Answers

Image #2
I thought this was very interesting. On this bird hanging from a suet feeder, we see the underside of the tail, with extensive white outertail feathers, and a white wing bar.
Being at a feeding station we can narrow the choices to backyard birds commonly seen in the east.

What has white outer tail feathers? Western Kingbird, Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, Northern Shrike, Loggerhead Shrike, Horned Lark, Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, Vesper Sparrow, Lark Sparrow, Lapland Longspur, and Eastern Meadowlark all do, but are highly unlikely to show up at a backyard feeding station. That leaves us with the resident Mourning Dove, Downy Woodpecker, Hairy Woodpecker, Northern Mockingbird and the wintering Dark-eyed Junco. The photo shows the fanned tail feathers make a uniform soft curve. Mourning Doves have long central tail feathers and the white is more restricted to the tips of the outer tail feathers. Woodpeckers feature two central tail feathers that are longer, stiffer and more pointed, used to balance themselves while climbing tree trunks. Hairy Woodpeckers have all white outer tail feathers, while the Downy shows two or three black spots on the white outer tail. Both birds would also show more white bars on the wing, than the bird in the image. The coloration and the amount of white looks good for the Slate-colored Junco, our common race of Dark-eyed Junco, but this bird has a conspicuous wing bar.

Amazingly, the final choice and correct answer to image #2 is the Northern Mockingbird. I have watched feeders for many years and never seen a mockingbird act like this. Hanging on the suet feeder it is using its spread tail to balance itself. In flight I think we all recognize that the mockingbird has white in the outer tail feathers, but we rarely if ever see it with its tail spread.

Image #3
I wonder how many of you looked at the stocky, hunched pose and long, rusty-colored, finely-barred tail and thought of pygmy owl, maybe even Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl? This bird is preening with his head forward and mantle feathers fluffed out. The grey spots are actually the feather tips in molt. Once the bird has molted, the back will be an even color. There are few birds with rusty-colored, finely-barred tails, and they are nearly all wrens! The pygmy-owl has broader barring than the the photo bird. While a Canyon Wren does have spots on its back, it is a rich rufous color, with fewer black bars on the tail. Winter Wren is ruled out with his short tail, and House Wrens are mostly grayer in color. And both of these species show fine barring across the mantle (back), not evident in this photo. Since the bird is perched on dead reeds, a good guess is Marsh Wren, but they have a rich, rufous rump and wing panel, and a strong black mantle with white streaks. Our image #3 is a Carolina Wren preening with its head down, showing an unusual amount of spots on the back (possibly due to molting?)

The common factor among these three quiz species is that they are all eastern backyard birds. Two of them, the wren and the mockingbird, were shown in very different poses to what we are accustomed to seeing. Thank you to all those that responded to this quiz. I hope you enjoyed the challenge.