Michael,

February 27 & 28 could well be early spring migrants. The illustrations of
female tails in the National Geo Guide contradict the id comment you quote,
showing Rufous rather than Broad-tailed with the more extensive rufous based
outer rectrices, and Rufous with the relatively more broadly rounded
rectrices vis-a-vis Allen's. Smaller size favors Rufous/Allen's over
Broad-tailed, which should be about the same size as Anna's (though I can't
recall seeing them side by side). The new Western Peterson's confirms this.

Gene Hunn.

At 01:07 AM 12/10/97 -0800, you wrote:
>Hi Tweets
>
>An old pal, Suann Hosie, gave me a call over the weekend: she's got what she
>thinks is a female Rufous Hummingbird Selasphorus rufus among the usual
>Anna's Hummingbirds Calypte anna at her feeder. It first showed up on
>Saturday Dec 06 1997 and again yesterday, Monday Dec 08, videotaped by Suann
>both times. Took a look at the videotape tonight, and though I'm not really
>very good at hummer plumages beyond definitive males, for sure it's a
>Selasphorus hummingbird, probably either Rufous or Allen's Hummingbird S.
>sasin, an immature female on width of rectrices.
>
>In one of two sequences there's conflict between this bird and a female
>Anna's, and a freeze-frame shows a fairly large tail showing much rufous at
>the bases of the outer rectrices, almost 50% of the feather, a mark that one
>guide says is indicative of female Broad-tailed Hummingbird S. platycercus,
>though two bands of fairly strong rufous-buff wash across the breast and
>belly likely eliminates this species from contention. Any comment on this
>would be welcome.
>
>I understand from what little ID literature I have on the Rufous/Allen's ID
>problem that separation of Rufous/Allen's females is categorically
>impossible in field conditions, that differences and variations within each
>species is greater than between the two species. Well, just to speculate,
>there's the overwhelming likelihood that it's a wrong-way female Rufous, but
>given the recent northward belt of warm air that's the possible proximate
>vehicle of a number of southern birds north (Hooded Oriole, Xantus's
>Hummingbird, Black Phoebe), Allen's Hummingbird can't be ruled out
>completely. To establish the ID conclusively, someone skilled in
>(hummingbird) biometrics would need to capture the bird and measure its
>vital stats to the nearest hundredth millimeter.
>
>Description from the videotape:
>
>Ventral View:
>
>Throat pale grey, lightly speckled with 'black' feathers which concentrated
>slightly at base of throat;
>Underparts grey-white with two roughly transverse bands of dull rufous-buff
>wash across breast and belly;
>Undertail coverts dull rufous-buff;
>Outer rects basal half brighter rufous-buff, distal third bright white,
>remainder black, giving appearance of mostly broad rufous-buff feathers with
>a thin black stripe separating the rufous-buff from the large white tips;
>tips wide and bluntly pointed.
>
>Dorsal View:
>
>Head and back unpatterned metallic emerald green;
>Tail as above.
>
>Bare Parts:
>
>Eye dark;
>Bill dark, straight, thin; approx 125% head-length;
>Feet dark.
>
>Clearly smaller than female Anna's, direct comparison.
>
>There are two main sequences: in one, it hovers at the feeder offering an
>unobstructed ventral view, holding its tail vertical and folded with only
>the occasional split-second partial fanning. In the other, the smaller bird
>aggressively bombs an astounded ( you can just see it saying 'what the
>%#$$???') sitting Anna's female, the two sparred briefly, then as the Anna's
>resumed its perch, the other sat briefly close and just below it before
>buzzing off. During this encounter, the subject bird gives a mostly
>unobstructed dorsal view of back and half the tail for a few split-seconds,
>though a small branch obstructs view of the central rectrices and right side
>of the tail.
>
>There's just one unreservedly accepted winter record of a Selasphorus
>hummingbird for BC (and none for Vancouver BC), an adult male Rufous
>photographed at a feeder in Victoria in Week 1 January 1983. There's another
>record, couched in pussyfoot language, to quote Campbell et al's Birds of
>BC: "On 28 February 1988, an adult female Rufous Hummingbird died of cold
>(UBC 14894) in North Vancouver. This appears to be the second valid winter
>record." Given we know the date, cause and location of her death and she
>constitutes a specimen record, one wonders what it would take to make her a
>demise a definitely acceptable winter record, Mass for the Dead at Saint
>Peter's? '-)
>
>Actually, there's a third that for whatever reason didn't appear in Birds of
>BC, an adult male I found poking around some flowering cherry trees in S.
>Vancouver BC on February 27 1980, a couple of weeks early, a very cold early
>evening just after rain, the low sun warming his rufous body tones until
>they glowed, and his gorget flashing like a little laser in among the cold
>pink blooms. Seeing him got me to wondering if Rufous actually overwinter
>this far north, and certainly wondering how the heck he was surviving that
>bitter late winter day.
>
>If anyone has any ID comments on the above, please feel free to respond.
>
>Michael Price We aren't flying...we're falling with style!
>Vancouver BC Canada -Buzz Lightyear, Toy Story
>mprice at mindlink.net
>
>
>