I went back out to the SJCR at about 1300 to chased the longspur some more
with Scott Rea and Dave Trochlill. We had several fair looks at the bird as
it flushed from one side of the big pond to the other around high tide. It
was small, buffy brown with darker brown streaking and large amounts of white
in the outer margins of the tail. The white in the tail appears to extend
along the entire outer margin of at least the two outer most feathers or
nearly so. The flight is goldfinch-like.

We had one opportunity to see the head well through a spotting scope in our
afternoon effort.

The bill was all darkish. The head had a dark, streaky crown. The head had a
very flat look from the bill tip to the back of the crown and the bill seemed
longish and narrow. The supercillium was buffy white. A dark line passed
from at least the eye to the back edge of the auricular. There was no malar mark.

The chin, throat and upper breast were buffy, possibly with some streaking.

The back was brown with darker streaking.

The call was a consistant "kittilittle." I may have single "kwee" during one flush.

The combination of fieldmarks most closely matches Chestnut-collared Longspur
and our consensus is that it is most probably this species.

I believe that Lapland Longspur may be eliminated based on the amount of white
in the tail, the very small size, the lack of a strongly patterned face and an
un-LALO-like call.

McCown's Longspur was also eliminated by the tail pattern. McCown's should
also be very pale and have a head and crown pattern different the bird we observed.

I have still not eliminated Smith's Longspur to my satisfaction as of yet.
The photograph of the female Smith's in the Master's Guide seems very much
like the bird I saw. The dark bill and strongish supercillium would be more
consistent with this species.



--
Mike Patterson
Astoria, OR
mpatters at orednet.org