I have pulled out a few photos of Pallid Swifts taken on Spain's Costa Brava (Aiguamolls de l’Empordà near Empuriabrava).
Pallid Swift: chunky chest, "blunt", broader wings, belly scaling.
Pallid Swift: belly scaling, overall paler than black (more brown-ish)As you can see, the photos are not that pretty at all, but they are good enough for ID shots. So, as with many difficult-to-identify bird species, it often helps to just have a go at taking some photos so that you can look through them more carefully at home (or ask the opinion of others).
One last thing, identification of Black Swift and Pallid Swift from photos is not always straightforward; different camera angles, lighting, bird position and individual variation can all play havoc with the process.
Happy birding
Dale Forbes
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4 comments:
Sometimes, that's all you need is an ID shot.
Nice blog!
Interesting post and photos. I use my photos for ID too - and sometimes an unusual one turns up!
I agree with you 100% Dale. I take photos many times of birds if I'm not sure of the ID. Like Mick said, sometimes I find other birds in the shot I never even saw because I was concentrating on my bird of interest.
On another note, Tirol is a gorgeous place and I'm glad I found your blog. My wife is German and when I visited there I loved that area.
Happy Birding to you!
one year as a teenager we went to Kruger National Park for a holiday. we had lists of the birds we wanted to see. the secretary bird was one I really wanted to see. Alas, the trip was over without a single sighting.
A few weeks later we got the photos back from developing and lo and behold, in the background behind some Kudu was a beautiful Secretary bird! I was never sure if I could tick it on my trip list or not.
Thank you for your comments, John, Mick and Larry!
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