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Posted by John Boyd on 10:23:46 02/13/05
Yesterday, Nancy Freedman, Dominic Sherony, and I went in search of the two Spindalises (Stripe-headed Tanagers) in the keys.
We started by heading down to Indigenous Park in Key West. We had barely gotten to the trees surrounding the pond when I looked up and spotted the bird! As always, male Stripe-heads are spectacular. Both Dominic and I got photos. After looking at them, the photos posted earlier, and the article on Spindalis identification in the Wilson Bulletin, it seems pretty clear this is a Cuban bird (S. zena pretrei).
While in the park we also found 10 warbler species, Hermit Thrush, and both Buntings. We next stopped at the Botanical Garden on Stock Island. It has completely changed since I was last there. Much of it was not recognizable. I gather that they are doubling the size of it.
We made several other stops on the way to Long Key, but they didn't yield much. At Long Key we looked in the island near the trail entrance, then circled the island once in search of the bird. We heard a suspicious call when we got back to the car and soon spotted the bird almost in front of us. Dominic managed to get one decent photo of her. After looking at the plates in the Spindalis ID article, I have to wonder if this bird might also be Cuban, mainly because of the prominent supercilium. However, the subspecific identification of females was not discussed in the article and the plate did not illustrate all of the relevant forms.
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