ID Challenge #5 - closes 14 November 2010

[Neil Fitzgerald]

bstephenson__28K5035.JPG (142.29 KiB) Viewed 17520 times

Another challenge via Brent's lens.
Answers for this challenge are due by replying to this topic by midnight (NZDT) on Sunday 14 November 2010.

Click here for the rules.

Answers will not be visible to anyone else until after the closing date.

The winner of the 2010-2011 ID Quiz will get one free place on a scheduled Wrybill Birding Tours, NZ pelagic trip, AND each person who enters this challenge goes into the draw to win a pair of Nikon Travelite V 8x25CF binoculars just for having a go, thanks to Photo & Video International!

[simon.fordham]

Buller's Albatross

[tim]

Going to go with Salvin's Albatross, possible photo Brent took down in Kaikoura

[ledzep]

Salvin's Albatross/Mollymawk.

[Michael Turner]

Mollymawk with grey head and neck, yellow tip and top of beak; appears to have white cap just peaking over the top of the wing. I'd go with Buller's.
Michael Turner

[Peter Frost]

Greetings from Malawi, courtesy of a R-E-A-L-L-Y S-L-O-W Internet connection (I'm worried the competition will close before this message gets posted):

Salvin's Mollymawk

[Shane McPherson]

tricky tricky,
bullers or salvins? I choose...

salvins albatross

[David J.K.]

Bullers Mollymawk

[Byrd]

well its an albatross, and obviously a Thalassarche rather than Diomedea. It has a thin black edge to the underwings which rules out the black-broweds and grey-headed. The head is pale grey with a white crown which I guess means either Salvin's or southern Buller's. I think Salvin's has less white on the underwing than the southern Buller's (?), and although the bill is mostly hidden it does look more like that of a Salvin's, so....

answer: Salvin's mollymawk (Thalassarche salvini)

[TonyWilson]

Salvin's albatross.
Cheers,
Tony.