siberian chiffchaff (tristris)

[maarten wielstra]

Hello everyone,

in october-november I saw and heard a tristris-chiffchaff near my house in Holland. It was a singing bird, and it also made the bullfinch-like calls. It was a bird of the grayish type with green frinches on primaries and green on the tail, so not the eastern brownish type. The bird also made some abberant calls resembling common chiffchaff. All the sounds can be heard here:

http://waarneming.nl/user/sounds/3166

And some pics (photo's and sonagrams) of the bird:

http://waarneming.nl/user/photos/3166

I'm curious if there is some one else that recorded similar abberent calls in tristris (in the UK or elsewhere). In favour recorded calls of a singing bird, just to be sure of the identification as true tristris.

I'm looking forward to the reactions,

Maarten Wielstra,
The Netherlands

excuse me for bad English language

[maarten wielstra]

I am also interested in soundrecordings of greyish, tristis-like birds identified as abietinus because of a call which did not resemble the classical call of tristis. In my opinion, these birds could be misidentified! They can't be proven to be tristis, that I understand, but do they deserve to be called a certain abietinus because of this?

[Brian S]

Maarten

The lack of response to your request for help is not due to lack of interest. The British Birds Rarities Committee, with the help of many outside experts, has been examining tristis and vocalisations - plus its relationship with abietinus. I am sure that there will be something published very soon in British Birds on the issue of just what these grey birds might be - especially when they call and sing like tristis.

Brian S

[RoyHargreaves]

Maarten

I saw a bird similar to this - although a milky tea-brown (that could appear grey in certain light), at Wilstone Res, Tring, UK. This bird had whitish supercilium and pale ear-coverts in January to early March. However, by the end of March it had a rich-buff supercilium and ear-coverts and a faint brown wash on the breast. This bird only uttered classic tristis calls and wasn't heard to sing by me (or anyone else that I am aware of). Lars Svensson and I discussed this bird and he looked at photos of the bird before and after this pre-breeding moult and saw no reason why it wasn't a first winter tristis. Also the Wilstone bird had a pale base to the lower mandible and this may be due to a pigmentation deficiency that was also reflected in the bird's paler plumage. The change in the bird's head pattern was dramatic. If it wasn't for the aberrant vocalisations I would be inclined to think your bird was like this. It could still be a pure tristis that has acquired vocalisations from abietanus or it could have mixed parentage. Personally I wouldn't trust recordings from the UK of an aberrant call from a tristis because you wouldn't be able to prove it was a pure tristis in the first place.

Roy

[Giroud Marc]

On a bird alone, it's very hard to say :"it's a pure tristis !"... What is and where are the limits of tristis ? I think it's impossible to find a good answer, only a clinal variation...

[maarten wielstra]

thank you all for the reactions. I'm looking forward to the article in British Birds. Is it possible to order just one issue of BB?

I'm glad that 'my' bird sang, I think that is the best feature for a 'real' tristis. But off course, there is a good possibility that tristis is clinal...

In Holland there seems to be an influx of 'tristris-like' birds. Several tens of birds are reported this autumn/winter, instead of the annualy very few birds...Same in UK?

[maarten wielstra]

Hi everyone,

what do you think about these calls:

http://waarneming.nl/sound/view/3317
and
http://waarneming.nl/sound/view/3316

I found this bird in 2003 in Holland, and last autumn I reconsidered them to be abberant tristis-calls. People with tristis-knowledge agree. Now I'm thinking about the lack of classical-tristis calls (it called very frequently) in this bird and also the plumage without any green (wings, rump). Therefore my fantasies went to Mountain Chiffchaff. Impossible as a rarity in W-Europe? But when I listen to the soundrecordings of Mountain on the following link my fantasy goes wild!:

http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=103557

Here some pics of the suspicious bird in 2003.

http://www.warbler.phytoconsult.nl/gallery.htm
then go to eastern chiffchaff

[Ross Ahmed]

Hi everyone,

what do you think about these calls:

http://waarneming.nl/sound/view/3317
and
http://waarneming.nl/sound/view/3316

I found this bird in 2003 in Holland, and last autumn I reconsidered them to be abberant tristis-calls. People with tristis-knowledge agree. Now I'm thinking about the lack of classical-tristis calls (it called very frequently) in this bird and also the plumage without any green (wings, rump). Therefore my fantasies went to Mountain Chiffchaff. Impossible as a rarity in W-Europe? But when I listen to the soundrecordings of Mountain on the following link my fantasy goes wild!:

http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=103557

Here some pics of the suspicious bird in 2003.

http://www.warbler.phytoconsult.nl/gallery.htm
then go to eastern chiffchaff

Maarten,

Your 'Noordwijk birds' i.e those which produced the inverted 'V' in the sonagram (1) on 13th November, sounds like birds which are also present in the UK. I noted 26 individuals giving this call in the autumn this year - the first was noted on 22nd June, and the last 21st Oct. Like you, these 26 individuals included twos, and even small groups, all uttering the same call simultaneously. An important point here is recent literature has stated that the presence of chiffchaffs giving this call, and chiffchaffs giving the tristis call, does not overlap in western Europe.

[MichaelF]

what do you think about these calls:

http://waarneming.nl/sound/view/3317
and
http://waarneming.nl/sound/view/3316


The mp3 links don't work?