Scott Ray:
> My vote is for a skilled someone to capture this bird and determine its sex
> despite resistance from some quarters. Apparently some believe that in the
> case of CCLO, capture is only ethical in their 'normal' range. What
> difference does it make where the bird is found?

> If captured and sexed the resulting data would indeed be of value to science
> judging from Dennis' comments.

But I think the question here is, by what criteria would it be sexed?
At least a couple of posts referred to banding keys and left the
reader confused.

This is why study of known-sex birds is important, how else do you
establish the parameters for distinguishing sex?

What we've seen thus far is a debate as to whether or not the
visual clues the guides point out are sufficient to correctly
sex the bird.

>From what I've seen thus far, capturing the bird would only shift
the uncertainty to the accuracy of banding keys...absent dissection,
at least.

- Don Baccus, Portland OR <donb at rational.com>