Any ideas? I had this bird come off the sea on Fair Isle this morning. Seems to look like a bird that hatched this year. Could it be an abbarent Swallow or perhaps a Swallow/Sand Martin hybrid. It has pretty bright pinkish legs. In the last picture the face shows a peachy wash but it was actually white. No red as in a typical Swallow. The brown head is really interesting. Any thoughts would be very welcome.
A similar bird was seen in flight on Unst at the weekend. Per Mike Pennington they apparently breed in Southern Spain in winter.
ReplyDeleteHi Rob, as Stephen says they do breed in the south in the winter and juvenile birds have been documented in BB occasionally about 20 years ago. If you have a copy of the BBFO reports to hand there is a piece in one about 10 years ago on a swallow x sand Martin in spring. Not too dissimilar to your bird but much smaller and structurally like a sand Martin. Deryk and I trapped a swallow house Martin hybrid in Kent in the early 90s (1991i think) Del may have some pics of that bird.
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ReplyDeleteCrap photo of my bird here: http://www.nature-shetland.co.uk/naturelatest/pics13/DSC04360.jpg. I have others, which are worse, which show that the face pattern was similar to yours. Couldn't really see the upperparts as it was in flight only and one a very grey overcast day.
ReplyDeleteAlso see my photo of an aberant Swallow c.29th April 2011 on this blog.
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