Birdwatch UK October 2017

40 Birdwatch•October 2017 http://www.birdguides.com/birdwatch

IDENTIFICATION

STEVE YOUNG (WWW.BIRDSONFILM.COM)

7 Yellow-browed Warbler (St

Mary’s, Scilly, 2 October 2011).

The small Phylloscopus warblers

are completely at home in their

typical habitat of tall trees, able

to hover acrobatically to pick

insects off the undersides of

leaves. This Yellow-browed

Warbler is performing just such a

manoeuvre, though the species

is less of an habitual hoverer

than Pallas’s.

IAN BUTLER

8 Hume’s Leaf Warbler (Wells

Wood, Norfolk, 3 December

2010). The whitish edges to the

tertials confirm that this is one

of the small leaf warblers, the

plain crown narrowing down the

choice to Yellow-browed or

Hume’s Leaf Warblers. The very

drab, greyish hues indicate the

latter, a diagnosis confirmed by

this bird’s rather subdued

supercilium, weak median covert

wing-bar and dark-looking bill and

legs.

JAMES LOWEN (WWW.JAMESLOWEN.COM)

9 Pallas’s Warbler (Fetlar,

Shetland, 8 October 2016). The

neat ‘postage stamp’ pale yellow

rump immediately identifies this

bird as a Pallas’s Warbler, but

note also the very bright and

contrasting face pattern with a

very broad golden-yellow

supercilium, dark olive crown-

sides and a strong dark loral line

and eyestripe. The Goldcrest-like

structure of Pallas’s Warbler,

with a large-looking head and

short tail, is also well captured

here.

7

8

9

1710 p37-43 ID photo guide leaf warblers FIN.indd 40 21/09/2017 15:50:59