Birding Opportunity (Initial Sighting)

Sighting Ref :

IB112791

Sighting Date :

15 Oct 18

Common Name :

Birding Opportunity

Scientific Name :

Initial Sighting

Location :

Westport

County :

Mayo

Number Seen :

Principal Observer(s) :

Matt Walsh Not Specified

Reported By :

Not Specified

Comments :

Mandt's Black Guillemot (Cepphus grylle mandtii). Hi. My name is Rodmund á Kelduni, i live on the Faroe Islands, i regulary wisit Irishbirding.com and to day i saw the photo of the day on the front, a photo off a Black Guillemot sighting Ref. IB112721, photo taken at Westport, Mayo, Bertra Strand, photo by Matt Walsh. I am 99% sure that it is NOT a common Black Guillemot but infact the high Arctic Mandt´s Black Guillemot. This i belive is a national first ? (RaK) - - - Hi Joe. The reason for i belive it is a Mandt´s, is the pure overall white impression its gives, expessualy head and pure white rump, however i am sure that the rarety committy will "demand" photos of spread wings before they will except it. I have seen two ad. Mandt´s at the Faroe Islands this year and this bird gives the same impression, i have attached some photos of the Faroe´s birds. Feel free to share them. (RaK) - - - It was interesting to read of Rodmund á Kelduni's impression that the Black Guillemot recently photographed by Matt Walsh in Westport looks like the Arctic subspecies, mandtii. While the bird in question does look pale, I do not get the impression that it is significantly paler then pale-end-of-the-range Black Guillemots that occur here, which presumably are of local origin. I am not sure what proportion of winter plumaged mandtii would be identifiable in a vagrant context, but I would expect to see almost pure white scapulars on an identifiable mandtii. I attach a montage showing Matt Walsh's bird alongside a pale (but not exceptionally so) adult I photographed at Kilmore Quay in December 2006. It would be interesting to hear precisely what feature(s) Rodmund regards as diagnostic of the ssp mandtii, in order to establish the extent of overlap in these features, if any, with nominate grylle. (KM)

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