Off Topic - Help with shorebird ID, please

[Koren Mitchell <>]

Looks to me like a Red Phalarope (Phalaropus fulicarius). I have a copy
of "Shorebirds - An Identification Guide" by Hayman, Marchant
and Prater which has a picture of the moulting juvenile, and it looks
just like this. Also check out

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         http://www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com/peterson/resources/identifications/reph/index.shtml
for some pictures and description. Apparently they mostly live offshore
but get blown inshore during storms, which fits with where you saw
it.

Cheers, Koren

At 08:08 7/04/2005,  wrote:
> This
> request is off topic because I saw and photographed this little shorebird
> on the coast of Oregon, in the USA, not in Australia.  I know that
> some American birders read this list, though, and shorebirds often travel
> great distances, so maybe this species has been seen by someone in
> Australia or Asia.  I saw the bird right after a large storm, in
> November of 1997.
>  
> I have been digitizing some old Hi-8 video, and I ran across some footage
> of this little guy.  I hadn't started birding in 1997, but I don't
> recall ever seeing another bird like this, in extensive birding up and
> down the west coast during the last five years.  I apologize for the
> quality of the pictures - they are screen captures from the video.
>  
> I have posted four pictures of the bird, at the bottom of the home page
> of my web site: www.barry15.com
> .  Scroll down to the bottom of the page to see the four
> pictures.
>  
> My best guess is a juvenile Sanderling, but I have never seen a
> Sanderling with black markings on its head like this, nor does the color
> of the wings seem right for a Sanderling.  It seems like this bird
> is probably in between its breeding plumage and its winter plumage, but
> even taking that into consideration, I can't identify it.  From the
> video and some comments I made at the time, I think the size was in the 6
> to 8 inch range, probably toward the smaller end of that range.
>  
> Any help, anyone?
>  
> Thanks in advance for any help anyone can give.
>  
> Barry
>

---

Koren Mitchell
Hong Kong
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