I agree with Trevor. Although withholding new birds is sometimes done
for one-upmanship purposes by the odd Englishman (in England), it is
usually done only for the welfare of the birds themselves. In the
Mossman-Port Douglas Pacific Swallow case, neither of these reasons
applied. The two people involved wanted to be absolutely sure that the
birds were accepted by the RAC before the announcement was made, even
thoughthey were absolutely convinced they were right.The amazing part is
that no one heard a whisper for eighteen months!
They still haven't disclosed the exact location of the nesting
community (there are several of these birds resident in the area), so I
suggest that if you want a Pacific Swallow on your list, just come with us
to PNG in March instead! Unless you're an Oz-lister of course. Other
swallows up this way at the moment are Barn and Red-rumped.
By the way, hasn't Red-rumped been resplit into H.daurica and H.
striolata the way they used to be ? Or is this another of my "Richard's
Pipit" stories.
May you all have lucky birding in this New Year.
Andy Anderson,Cairns.
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