Yesterday [Sunday Feb 7] I came across a fresh Shearwater carcase on the beach
at Boat Harbour, near Kurnell. I did not have a bird book with me, and did not
retrieve the carcase as I was in the middle of a longish walk with the Sydney
Bush Walkers.
But I took details, confident of identifying it when I got home. But, not to
be!
For starters, in general appearance it was blackish [above] and gleaming white
[below]. White below, that is, except for an extremely thin black line on the
trailing edge of the wing, and smudges [only] at wing shoulder and wing tip.
AXILLARIES PURE WHITE: definitely not a Flutterer, let alone a Hutton's. White
cheeks, up to the eye line, but not beyond. Bluish feet.
Length, stretched out, bill to tail tip, c.38 cm; wingspan, c. 90 cm. Curses!
Up until this point I was sure, looking at the illustration in my Pizzey, that
it was going to be a Little Shearwater. But it's too big.
[unless I was stretching its corpse out too aggressively!!!],
and Pizzey shows the Little as having white above the eye line.
Any suggestions?
Ted Nixon
Greenwich
C.E.V. Nixon
Birding NSW
NSW Bird Atlassers
22/4 Landenburg Place
Greenwich 2065
02 9460 8224
==============================www.birding-aus.org
birding-aus.blogspot.com
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