Ken - You were fortunate to have the help of Mark and Stuart. Many of the variations in plumage (age, sex and seasonal – to say nothing of geographic) of
Australian birds are not well known. The HANZAB illustrations might or might not help in a particular case. It was hoped the long-awaited CSIRO Publishing field guide would be an advance in that regard and several local photographers had submitted juv/sub-adult
examples to help with this. I don’t know when that FG might appear. However, there will always be transitional problems: “But
MY juvenile doesn’t look like THAT picture!” What will help in due course is the capturing of a complete range of variations by digital photographers. These would need to be brought into one place (with accurate particulars attached) rather
than spread over a number of public, official and private websites. I had hoped the COG website would have offered by now a reasonable range of photographed variations for local purposes (incorporating for example Ken’s juv WG and Con’s splendid BHe), but
whether a reorganised and labelled COG gallery will appear before the CSIRO Publishing field guide or the first passenger boarding Light Rail is an open question.
From: Ken Bissett [
Sent: Thursday, 3 March 2016 10:55 PM
To: Stuart Rae
Cc: canberra birds
Subject: Re: [canberrabirds] ID help please
Many thanks to all who responded. Thanks to Con, Mark and especially Stuart who have provided us with some very good information to assist with the identification of the bird as a juvenile western gerygone.
We knew that the bird was young and it's surprising just how different plumage can be as birds develop.
regards
Ken
On 3 March 2016 at 21:30, Stuart Rae <> wrote:
On 2 March 2016 at 08:58, Ken Bissett <> wrote:
This little bird seen in the trees at Mulligans Flat big dam yesterday has us a little stumped. There were a few other birds like this also present. Would appreciate some help please
thanks
Ken
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