Readers’ wildlife photos

Well, this is it, people: the last batch of photos I have on hand. Please send in yours if you have good ones. Thanksgiving break would be a good time to get those snaps together.

Today’s pictures come from Paul Handford, who sent photos of thrushes from British Columbia and Ireland. Paul’s captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

Here’s a sampler of members of the Family Turdidae, the thrushes et al.  Some are from our decade living in south central British Columbia, while others are from around here now, in Ireland.

First, BC. As before, all images are from the area around Kamloops, mostly from our yard.

American robin, Turdus migratorius: IMG_7029.

Almost everyone living in North America is familiar with this bird, dubbed “robin” on account of its brick-red underparts, recalling to early European immigrants their familiar Old World robin, a much smaller bird, from a different avian family.  Its vocalizations and general behaviour strongly resemble those of the Eurasian blackbird in the same taxonomic genus, Turdus merula (see below):

Mountain bluebird, Sialia currucoides.

A bird of higher-elevations in western parts of the continent.  The males are the very bluest of the three North American. bluebird species.  Like other Sialia species, they are cavity-nesters, and feed primarily on ground invertebrates, spotted from elevated perches on fence-posts and local vegetation.

Females are generally a more subtly beautiful beige & ashy, with blue restricted to wings, rump and tail.

Male:

Female:

Townsend’s solitaire, Myadestes townsendi.

Like the mountain bluebird, this is a species of the mountainous west.  It is a year-round resident in southern BC, but its breeding range extends way north into Yukon and Alaska.  Almost exclusively insectivorous in the breeding season, it overwinters in our area on diverse berries—as here on rowan (Sorbus):

Swainson’s thrush, Catharus ustulatus.

Other than in the mountains and coasts of the western US, this is a breeding bird of forsts and woodlands of Canada and Alaska.  More often heard than seen, this secretive bird has a distinctive haunting, flute-like song [JAC: you can hear its songs here.]

Varied thrush, Ixoreus naevius.

Another strictly western bird, one typical of the deep forest, where its one-note songs, usually repeated at slightly different pitches, provide for a rather eerie ambience.  Though mainly a summer breeder in BC, individuals often would overwinter, subsisting on berries, again in our dependable rowan tree:

Eurasian blackbird, Turdus merula:

This species is the rough counterpart of the American robin:  a familiar songster in parks and gardens pretty much all over.  As Paul McCartney memorably told us, they often do produce their lovely fluting song “in the dead of night”. [JAC: A variety of song recordings is here.]

Male.  The male is the one that gives the vernacular name. Apart from crows et al, this is the only common jet black bird in these parts, so the name offers no room for ambiguity:

Female:  The female’s plumage is mostly a rather sooty brown, and it lacks the striking crocus-yellow bill and eye-rign of the male:

Mistle thrush, Turdus viscivorus.  

A large, rather pale greyish thrush, with round spots on the white breast and belly, that forms noisy little gangs during the winter, often giving their distinctive rattling calls.  They have a typical thrush invertebrate + fruit diet, though their names derive from a presumed predilection for the beries of mistletoe, Viscum album:

Song thrush, Turdus philomelos.  
This is the thrush that most closely resembles the form of the typical North American thrushes, with brown-russet back, with streaky-spots on pale under-parts that becoming buffy on flanks and near the throat.  A familiar denizen of gardens and parks, as well as in woodland and forests, this thrush has a distinctive song comprising sequences of repetitions of short whistled phrases: