wgeoff

Here is the photo taken by Phoebe Fan of the possible Northern Hawk Cuckoo, taken yesterday near the school on Po Toi, together with a close-up of the tail





Unfortunately, there are no photos of the front of this bird.
However, the very late date, the brownish sub-terminal tail bar, the hooded appearance with some dark marks on the throat suggest this is a Northern Hawk Cuckoo - see the paper by Paul Leader on page 347 of the 2007-08 HKBR.

My thanks to Phoebe for sending me this photo and allowing it to be posted here

[ Last edited by wgeoff at 8/11/2013 10:38 ]

lpaul

An interesting bird...

There are indeed a number of pro-Northern HC features on this bird: the dark chin, apparent rufous sub-terminal tail band, also the primary projection looks very long c.f. Hodgson's and of course the date is notable being close to the latest of the 3 Northern HC  records (between 29 Sep and 27 Oct) and with no records for Hodgson's beyond Aug in HK.

However, the tail is clearly re-growing which could of course significantly impede migration so I don't think we can attach too much weight to date.  This also makes an assessment of primary projection more difficult.  Furthermore, it seems to be a second year bird, for which plumages of both NHC and HHC are pretty much unknown.

Based on this and in the absence of photos of the underparts (which might have clinched ID) I think that this is probable NHC at best.

wgeoff

Thanks for the comprehensive review Paul.

Although I think the final judgement 'probable at best' is rather harsh for a bird where all the visible features, including what is visible of the front, are consistent with Northern Hawk Cuckoo, as is the date which would be quite extraordinary for Hodgson's.

Unfortunately the bird was not seen yesterday on Po Toi so may have left.

lpaul

Why 'rather harsh'?  We don't know what the effects of complete tail loss might have on the timing of migration and we don't fully understand sub-adult plumages. Are you saying this is 'certainly' a NHC?

As far as I understand it, there is nothing which is diagnostic of NHC in the photos; as such probable seems fair.

[ Last edited by lpaul at 11/11/2013 13:49 ]