We’re moving into new territory here, with no colouration to help the identification process.
Often in the field you aren’t lucky enough to get a look at the colour though – particularly on cloudy days. Or colours can be mistaken; blue can seem black, brown can seem orange… this is when you need to be looking at other aspects of the bird; size, shape, legs, etc…
There is enough in this particular photo to get to the family pretty quickly, but identifying the final species might prove a little tricky:
As per usual the answer will be revealed in this Friday’s Week in Pictures.
Good luck!
James, I have no idea what this bird is called
Flunking another bird test! Need to pay attention in January!! Congratulations on being Condé Nast’s first pick!! Good judgement on their part!! Victoria
is it a secretary bird ?
or marsh eagle ?
Now this one is rather tough. Based on the general giss of the bird I’d say its one of the herons. I’m calling it as a Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea). The head plumes rule out Goliath Heron and the egrets. The smaller herons prefer to be lower down in and amongst the reeds and the body looks a bit long for them. Seeing there is no colour it’s very difficult to split the Grey Heron from the Black-headed Heron and Purple Heron. I’m going with Grey Heron over Black-headed Heron because the plumes look long and more exaggerated than you would see on a Black-headed Heron. I went with the Grey Heron over the Purple Heron mainly because they are more common and the bird looks a bit more bulky and Purple Herons prefer thicker reeds and I made a judgement call that this dead tree is closer to one of the smaller pans that doesn’t have very thick reeds surrounding it.
Looking forward to tomorrow’s TWIP to see what it was!
It seems like it might be part of the secretary bird family by the spikey head feathers, but the legs appear to be too short for this species……?
Black crowned night heron?
Very close…
The “What Bird is This?” feature is a great one. How about making it a weekly feature?!
I did not read the answer yet. Is it a green backed heron? I have only seen them in river beds before so if it is one then it is a first for me in a tree.