Highly probable COMMON SNIPE St. Mary's County

[Matt Hafner]

Mikey Lutmerding has found a snipe that looks very much like a COMMON SNIPE on Camp Brown Rd in St. Mary's County. Photos from his camera like the one attached have been sent to a few people who think it looks very good! Look at those white underwings!!! Amazing record!!!

Directions: on the right side of Camp Brown just past Fairview Rd.

Good luck!

Matt Hafner
Forest Hill, MD

[Mikey Lutmerding]

Hi everyone,

I apologize in advance, I was just told in no uncertain terms by the land owner that no one is welcome to look at the fields for this bird, it is private property but I was on the road the whole time and did not think it an issue, I tried to explain the magnitude of the record and he told me that no one was to look at his fields.

Sorry for this news,

Mikey

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[Jason Berry]

Hi Everyone,

I don't mean to cause a huge ugly debate, but isn't the shoulder of the road public right of way?  If so, could one still "look at the fields" if they stay on public land?

Now I totally agree with respecting private property rights and not pissing off people.  That being said, I don't see the need to allow someone to restrict public access to a public right of way.

Am I wrong about this?  Does MD not have these public right aways?  Or is it not permitted to have people walk in these areas?

Thanks and again, I don't mean to cause any nasty debate - just honest questions from a DCer!

Jason Berry

Washington, DC

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From: Mikey Lutmerding <mlutm...@gmail.com>
To: Matt Hafner <hafne...@gmail.com>
Cc: mdbi...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, March 24, 2013 5:16 PM
Subject: Re: [MDBirding] Highly probable COMMON SNIPE St. Mary's County

[Frank Boyle]

This is where property rights cross the line from reasonable to paranoid.  Only in America, I am afraid.  

Frank Boyle

Rohrersville, MD

Sent from my iPhone

[Art Drauglis]

As my dad once said, "If you don't want people looking at your a--, then don't leave the house without pants".
In that vein if that guy doesn't want people looking at his fields while on a public road, he should a fence or plant trees

Not that I am in favor of confrontation, and I would be unlikely to find the bird if I looked, but that sort of attitude drives me up the wall.

Art Drauglis
Washington, DC

[jo...@aol.com]

Public roads are right of ways.  However, if the farmer is THAT upset, he could solve the whole issue by shooting the bird... just sayin'.   That would not be a good outcome. 

Wonder if someone might know him and "charm" him into softening his stance?

Joanne

Joanne Howl, DVM
jo...@aol.com
West River MD

[Frank Boyle]

I have found that property rights extremists are often as immovable as, say, those who misinterpret the Second Amendment.  I am from Vermont, which has a very vocal, conservative part if the populace in regards to property rights.  Wish I could say that common ground could be found here, but sometimes it cannot and we have to move on to more birder-friendly pastures, so to speak.

Frank Boyle

Rohrersville, MD

Sent from my iPhone

[James Tyler Bell]

Having just returned from a very frustrating snipe hunt at the aforementioned location, the field is on the edge of a public road so legally, birders have every right to be there and to scope the field. But, with the landowner being that adamant, you have to tread softly and try to kiss some @ss. We were speculating from conversations with him that it's possible that a birder posted photographs of the area that included a girlfriend which isn't helping his ugly divorce. Just speculation.

Anyway, we tried to conform but finally got fed up and moved to a better viewing location as light was failing. The snipe were far off in the field and moved between grass clumps and wet area giving glimpses of a paler bird that we all hoped was the subject. We never were able to see the underwing as in Mikey's photo so all we can say is that there was a paler snipe in amongst upward of 100+ at one point but down to about 15-20 when light failed.

Good luck to anyone else going and try and keep the peace.

 

Tyler Bell
jtyle...@yahoo.com
California, Maryland

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From: Mikey Lutmerding <mlutm...@gmail.com>
To: Matt Hafner <hafne...@gmail.com>
Cc: mdbi...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, March 24, 2013 5:16 PM
Subject: Re: [MDBirding] Highly probable COMMON SNIPE St. Mary's County

[James Tyler Bell]

Feel free to shoot holes in this photo, which is heavily cropped, and ISO set at 1600. A flock of a couple dozen snipe flew in from the original field to the winter wheat field on the south side of Camp Brown Road. This field is clearly safe for viewing. Anyway, I was snapping away as they flew in to land though they never did. The top bird in the photo had the palest underwings of anything I could pick out though the secondaries don't appear to be broadly edged white as in Mikey's photo. Wishful thinking?

 

Tyler Bell
jtyle...@yahoo.com
California, Maryland

---

From: James Tyler Bell <jtyle...@yahoo.com>
To: "mdbi...@googlegroups.com" <mdbi...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, March 24, 2013 8:19 PM

[Paul Pisano]

Perhaps someone could suggest to the homeowner that he set aside an area for people to park and look for the bird, and charge $10/head.  If so, he could bring in some real cash.  I certainly would be willing to pay.

Good birding,

Paul Pisano

Arlington, VA

[Jared Fisher]

Hi all, 

Here are few links I've come across this evening that might be of interest. 

Kimball Garrett's photo gallery of the 2011 California bird that was taken by a hunter. Includes side by side specimen comparisons. 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/72081027@N05/sets/72157628434955641/

Dave Brown's blog entry about the 2011 Newfoundland bird. Includes comparison photos. 

http://birdingnewfoundland.blogspot.com/2011/02/common-snipe.html

Writeup on the identification by Jon Dunn

http://www.westernfieldornithologists.org/docs/abstracts/38-2FP.pdf

Jared Fisher

Bethesda, MD

[Mikey Lutmerding]

Hi everyone,

I wanted to send the link to photos of the bird-

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeycerw

Any and all comments welcomed, I was hoping to get better images, but hopefully these will do for something!  I will do a more in depth write up tomorrow, but it has been a long day and I need some sleep!

As far as the landowner situation, it ended on a mostly positive note, he explained to me that he has had problems with poachers, vandals, and property being stolen, I spoke with him about options to allow for more folks to look for the bird but made it clear that he did not want anyone looking at his fields.

Good birding!

Mikey

Mikey Lutmerding
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeycerw/
Croom, MD

[Phil Davis]

Hi everyone:

For what it's worth, I was about one-third of the way towards Saint Mary's County to look for the bird, before sunset, when I saw Mikey's admonishment about the farmer, so I turned around ...


Anyway, a few quick personal comments from some earlier Alaskan snipe experiences ... I have seen Common Snipe on the Aleutians and on Bering Sea islands, including Attu, St. Paul Island, at Gambell on Saint Lawrence Island, and at Adak Island.

On Attu, you would work the tall wet meadows and when you kicked up a snipe it would invariably explode up and fly away from you. Your best bet in identifying a Common (then called the Eurasian form - gallinago) was to look for the broad(er) white trailing edge on the secondaries as the bird lifted off and flew high away from you, as they always did (i.e., they never flew back towards you!)

At St. Paul and Gambell, after the AOU re-spilt the Common Snipe back into Wilson and Common, people became a lot more diligent in trying to separate the two species. Snipe are not regular at either place, however, occasionally, you might find one on the ground or kick one up. Common Snipe are not just lighter colored overall, they are warmer brown and not colder gray, as are Wilson's. There are also some subtle plumage differences.

My best experience with them, however, was at Adak. When Adak opened up for commercial birding tours in 2004, we found that both Common and Wilson's were present, in the same locations. Since it was spring (May), the birds displayed and called and you could hear the differences in winnowing (Common is lower in pitch due to one fewer pair of tail feathers) and in its circular display flight overhead you could see the lighter underwing on Common's (which normally wasn't apparent as a bird was flying away from you) and you could also key on the differences in the width of the white trailing edge of the secondaries. (However, I never was able to pick out the difference in tail shapes of the displaying birds, which surprised me - I thought I would be able to do so ... the outermost feathers stick out differently on the two species.)

That being said, some observations related to Mikey's bird based on the photos and his report ...


Overall coloration - warmer (supportive)

Underwing color - light (supportive)

Underwing pattern - appears to be supportive of Common

Trailing edge of the secondaries - appears prominent in at least one of the photos (supportive)

Number of tail feathers/shape of tail - N/A

Call - N/A


Some other things to think about: Many consider there to be two subspecies of Common Snipe. Most Alaskan, western N.A., and Labrador records are considered to be the more widespread nominate subspecies. Differences and subtleties dealing with the northern European subspecies (faeroeensis) should be considered.

Aging - These species are tough to age after the fall.

Similar species: There are some other similar sized and superficially similar species that should be eliminated: Pin-tailed Snipe, Latham's, Solitary, and Swinhoe's. At least two of these have been recorded in North America.


(I have lots of reference material on my shelf on snipe - just need the time to dig them out and review them!)


Sidenote: This is very ironic ... When I saw the recent reports of large numbers of snipe at places like Oxbow Lake, a week or so ago, I started to post a message to MD Birding reminding people to look out for the unlikely Common Snipe and recap some of the ID differences. I was going to say that one of these days, one was going to be found up in the Mid-Atlantic region. However, I decided to not post anything, since I figured that people would think I was crazy! (No comments, please!)

Hope this helps ... or not ...

Phil

At 23:19 03/24/2013, Mikey Lutmerding wrote:

Hi everyone,

I wanted to send the link to photos of the bird-

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikeycerw

Any and all comments welcomed, I was hoping to get better images, but hopefully these will do for something!  I will do a more in depth write up tomorrow, but it has been a long day and I need some sleep!

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Phil Davis      Davidsonville, Maryland     USA
                  mailto:PDa...@ix.netcom.com
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