People often ask me why I stop to watch seemingly non-descript birds. I generally give them an answer that varies from philosophical to aesthetic, generally with an ecological twist. However from now on I am going to recount to them the possibility that the innocuous little grey bird bearing a strong resemblance to a dozen other nearby little grey birds might just be a White-crested Elaenia, Elaenia albiceps, as seems to be the case presently on South Padre Island in Texas as The Hawk Owl’s Nest reports.
If verified, and from the reports coming in as well as the photos it seems verification is likely (although the question of whether it is an escape may linger a bit longer), then this will be the first U.S. record of a bird that should be no closer to the south Rio Grande Valley than southern Columbia. Such a bird is well worth the effort, I’d say, of stopping for a few minutes to puzzle out the identity of a bird you might otherwise pass by but stop just because “it didn’t seem quite right.”
As Ludlow Griscom so wisely counseled, learn the birds of your area well so you will immediately be able to tell when an unusual and out-of-place species comes into view. Of course, upon the sighting of such a bird, or any such species for that matter, my own question then becomes “Why is it so far from it’s normal habitat?”
Peace and good bird watching.
