On yesterday's Southport pelagic, I got a couple of photographs of
pterodromas (petrels) that illustrate the dangers of using the
commercially available field guides. That the birds were pterodromas
was obvious with their white chins - the question for me was whether
they were the regular providence petrels or [I think the locally less
common] kermadec or herald petrels.
The point was that the birds clearly had pale bellies [off white with
brown flecks]. Indeed, one bird very closely matched the drawing on p
59 of Pizzey and Knight (1997 ed) of an intermediate morph herald
petrel.
Neither Pizzey & Knight, Simpson & Day nor Morecombe mention the
possibility of providence petrels having a pale belly. The good old
reader's digest "complete book of australian birds" on the other hand
notes that "In flight at sea the Providence Petrel looks generally
brown toned. Its head is clearly dark and in favourable lighting
conditions contrasts strongly with the paler, almost buff tones of its
underparts".
While getting the general shape right, Pizzey & Knight only show the
underbody of providence petrels as dark chocolate brown. Morecombe
describes the underparts as "slaty grey-brown" and compares providence
petrels to dark morph kermadec and herald petrels. Simpson & Day has
virtually no description, but at least describes the body as grey, and
if you [can find and ] look closely at the half-matchbox sized
drawings, it does show some of the colour transitions in the right
places.
What I would like to know is why, in the case of Pizzey & Knight, which
at least has the most commentary and the most life-like drawings, and
which devotes whole pages to both the wandering and shy albatrosses,
can't put in a single line mentioning that providence petrels can
appear with pale bellies totally at variance with their main drawing.
Given that the "brown petrels" are pretty hard to ID from rocking
boats, it would be most helpful if the field guides could include
include a bit more detail on how the birds look in flight over sea.
[Something to keep in mind for your next review of field guides Lawrie
C].
Regards, Laurie.
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