Hi Judith,
I think that Carol has seen some Dollarbirds, no doubt in my mind...
The flight feathers are much darker than the rest of wing in most lights & can
appear at times as a darker trailing edge.
The dollar marks can be hard to see with the naked eye, but even these could be
described as teal (but very pale!!!) coloured - although I think that the
palest of sky blues would be a better description, or even better a
bluish-white - they don't always appear silver, esp with the naked eye...
My bet is that Coral didn't pick the small pale windows with her naked eyes in
any case, which is not unexpected without bins.
The shape & length of tail, overall size & colour of bird, bill colour (yes,
red can appear yellow/orange without bins) & bill legth, calls, description of
flight, & habit of being high in she-oaks at an ecotione with mangroves, all
point without any doubt in my mind to be definite Dollarbirds (& maybe juvenile
birds with yellowish bills).
I think maybe the dollar wing markings have gone unoticed by Coral without bins
& were therefore not a "diagnostic" feature that she recalls - these marks are
not always easy to see without bins...
Cheers,
Martin Cachard
Cairns
> From:
> To: ;
> Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2013 18:26:09 +1100
> CC:
> Subject: Re: [Birding-Aus] FW: Unidentified bird.
>
> Does she know the Australasian Figbird and Olive-backed Oriole? They are
> the only species that come to mind at present.
>
> Regards
>
> Greg
> Dr Greg. P. Clancy
> Ecologist and Birding-wildlife Guide
> PO Box 63 Coutts Crossing NSW 2460
> 0266493153 0429601960
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Judith Hoyle
> Sent: Thursday, January 31, 2013 6:04 PM
> To: BirdingAus
> Cc:
> Subject: [Birding-Aus] FW: Unidentified bird.
>
>
> Hello Birding Ausers
>
> I would be interested in your opinions of the description below. I spoke to
> Coral this afternoon to go through details of her sighting. She is
> catagoric that the birds she saw were not Dollarbirds which was my guess,
> especially given the call description. With the exception of a thin black
> border around the wings the colour on the top of the wings was a uniform
> iridescent green colour similar to the speculum of the black duck in certain
> lights. She did not observe anything that resembled a 'dollar' in the wings
> of the birds in flight. The bill was approximately an inch long (she was
> unable to determine the shape as she did not have her binoculars with her)
> and yellow or light orange. She observed them on Wednesday 23 January, high
> up in the mangroves/she-oaks at Twin Waters on the north shore of the
> Maroochy River, near the spit.
>
> The description has me stumped! Any suggestions???
>
> Kind regards
>
> Judith
>
>
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