[cobirds] Boulder stub-tailed wren

Hello, Birders.

Steve Mlodinow writes:

> In any case, I don't claim to know anything, but I would be wary of labelling 

> this bird a Pacific Wren. I hold Ted Floyd, its finder, 

Note Ted Floyd's original language... ;-)

> This Sunday morning, Jan. 19th, I audio-recorded at Walden Ponds, 

> Boulder County, a stub-tailed wren that I believe was a Pacific Wren. 

It's always good to be equivocal about problematic taxa like Pacific Wrens. Apologies if my language wasn't emphatically equivocal enough.

In my opinion, the identity of this bird is currently unresolved. ("The identities of these birds...?" Several folks have contacted me offline about the possibility of multiple birds.)

Joe Morlan, a renowned birding educator in California, has famously stated that the most enduring and most powerful learning experiences for birders are the ones that involve unresolved IDs. In this case, I have learned a lot from Steve Mlodinow and others about plumage characters for stub-tailed wrens. I confess, until this episode, I woulda said, "Just listen...and get a recording." But there's a lot more on the plumage front than I had appreciated. And it's gratifying that our knowledge of plumage differences is evolving; we know more than we did five years ago, and we'll probably know more five years hence.

Now, here's something that will induce both ecstasy and abhorrence in Steve Mlodinow: At sunrise this morning, I made numerous audio recordings of "white-cheeked geese" at the B. h. hutchinsii [Cackling] / B. c. parvipes [Canada] divide. Separating those taxa is challenging, to say the least. And now Steve gets to ponder their call notes!

There were Bushtits this Friday morning, Jan. 24, at Greenlee Preserve, Boulder County, contributing yet another datum to that species' absolutely meaningless pattern of occurrence in the area.

Ted Floyd

Lafayette, Boulder County, Colorado