[BirdPhotoIndia] Fw: blyths pipit, khajuraho - india, 9.10.11

two pics of the same bird. i will post 2 more pics in my subsequent
emails. response from Mr. A.M. Sen is attached with due permission
from him. file names are referred differently in his email but
hopefully that does not pose a serious problem.

---------- Forwarded Message -----------
From: Abhijit Menon-Sen <ams@toroid.org>
To: Prosenjit Singha Deo <deo@bose.res.in>
Sent: Thu, 24 Nov 2011 22:49:33 +0530
Subject: Re: [OBPix] id help please, khajuraho - india, 9.10.11

> thank you very much for your interest.

Well, they're the most interesting pipits I've seen for a while. :-)

I agree that your photographs all show the same species, and they are
all a bit strange-looking. Overall quite Paddyfield-like, but they have
very broad dark centres to the median coverts, with contrastingly white
thin edges. There's more than a little of the Tree Pipit look to them as
well… but they're not Tree Pipits, as shown by the long (but not as long
as Paddyfield on average) hindclaw and the dense streaking on the breast
not extended to the flanks. Finally, the bird in the bottom left in p22
just about shows a well-developed pair of pale and dark streaks down the
back, with similar streaking on the crown. This is not something you'd
ever see on Paddyfield. The colour also seems a bit more brown than the
pale sandy of the typical Paddyfield.

So I must conclude that these are Blyth's Pipits. Median coverts and
hindclaw and general shape of the head and body support this id, but
Blyth's usually has a more obviously conical bill. These birds have
a very Paddyfield-like bill (but some variation is to be expected;
I've seen two Blyth's Pipits next to each other with very different
bill-shapes).

The bird in p21 is calling. I don't suppose you have a recording, or
even remember the call well enough to describe it?

-- ams
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