Puzzled By Birds 2: Day Eight

From the finish line, Kenn and Kimberly write: Now we’re on the eighth day of our bird puzzle, and almost the whole creature is now visible. Unless the bird has its name tattooed on one of the few spots that’s still hidden, we’re seeing about as much as we’re going to see. So this is the point where the game contestant says:

"I’d like to buy a fowl."

And we fill in the last remaining pieces.

With the entire bird visible, it’s quite straightforward -- the only North American bird with that two-banded chest pattern is the Killdeer, that abundant, noisy plover of fields and open ground. We purposely kept the second chest band covered until late in the game, to give you a chance to focus on other features.

We were pleased to get dozens of responses to the quiz. A few brave souls even guessed on the first day, although no one got it right until a couple of days later than that. In the early returns, Mountain Plover was the most popular choice, and that was a good guess on the basis of what was visible. Mountain Plover is also brown above and white below, the pattern of the back of its head is similar, and it also lives in dry grassy places. Upland Sandpiper also got some votes, undoubtedly on the basis of habitat.

The first person to get the correct answer was Janet Creamer, a fine naturalist from Indiana and a contributor to two excellent and worthwhile sites, the Indy Parks Nature Blog and Midwest Native Plants, Gardens, and Wildlife. Looking at the habitat and at the small amount of the bird visible on the third day, Janet deduced that Killdeer was the most likely identification.

Others who came in shortly afterwards with the correct answer included Carol at Wildlife Around Us, Kirk Mona, Barb Myers, "Dave C," Marcel Such, Joel Such, Jim Royer, and Barbara Coley. Ohio’s well-known nature expert Jim McCormac took a look, a few days in, and identified it with immediate confidence: "Killdeer!" We knew we couldn’t fool Jim for long. And many more people got the answer right as more of the bird was revealed.

Thank you to everyone who took part; we hope you found it more entertaining than aggravating! Best wishes for enjoying birds out in the field the rest of this month. We hope that we’ll see many of you at the Midwest Birding Symposium, which is about to start at Lakeside, Ohio, practically in our back yard.

Puzzled By Birds 2: Day Seven

From Oak Harbor, Ohio, Kenn and Kimberly write: Here we are on the seventh day of our bird puzzle challenge, wherein the bird and its habitat are gradually revealed, a fragment at a time. By now there’s a lot of the bird visible. Are you ready to take a guess? We won’t publish the comments (so don’t worry about possibly getting it wrong), but we will give credit to those who are among the first to get it right.

Puzzled By Birds 2: Day Six

From a rather hurried state en route to a research meeting, Kenn and Kimberly write: This is the sixth day of our gradual puzzle challenge, and by now a fair amount of the bird is visible. Can you tell what it is? Send us a comment if you’d like to guess. We won’t publish the comments (because we want everyone to have a chance to work it out on their own), but there will be honor and recognition for those who are among the first to get the answer right, and graceful anonymity for those who get it wrong. This is just for fun, after all.

Puzzled By Birds 2: Day Five

From Puzzlebird Headquarters, Kenn and Kimberly write: This is the fifth day of our ongoing puzzle challenge, wherein we fill in a few more pieces of the bird every afternoon. When you think you know what the bird is, send us a comment. We won’t publish the comments until after the quiz is over, and we won’t even publish your comments then unless you specifically say we can, but we will announce who came up with the correct answer first. (So down below, where it says "0 comments," that’s actually not true -- comments are coming in from all over, and we’re pleased to see that so many seem to be enjoying this challenge.)

Puzzled By Birds 2: Day Four

From out in cyberspace, Kenn and Kimberly write: If you’re just joining us, this is the fourth installment of an ongoing puzzle. Every day from now through next Tuesday, at about 3 p.m. (Eastern Daylight time) we’ll reveal a few more pieces of this jigsaw puzzle bird. How many pieces do you need before you can identify it to species? If you really want to challenge yourself, of course, you could go back to the first entry on September 8 and try to identify the bird from the tiny fragments shown there.

Puzzled By Birds 2: Day Three

From the bird factory, Kenn and Kimberly write: This is the third day in a row of our diabolical bird puzzle. Today you can see a little more of the bird than you could yesterday. Ready to take a stab at identifying it? You can send us a guess through the "comments" section and it won’t actually be published until the quiz is over, and not even then unless you specifically ask us to, so don’t worry about making a wrong guess! We’ll be proud to crown as the winner whoever gets the species right first. And if you can’t tell what it is yet, check back later ... we’ll reveal a little more of the bird and its habitat every day for the next six days.

Puzzled By Birds 2: Day Two

From Puzzlebird Central, Kenn and Kimberly write: In yesterday’s post we described how this "photo quiz" works. Every day, for eight days in a row, we’ll repeat this photo with a few more of the pieces filled in each time. Provided we got the settings right, each day’s post will appear around 3 p.m., Eastern Daylight Time. If you’re up for a challenge, see how many pieces you need to have filled in before you can identify the mystery puzzle bird.

Jamming with the birds

From Oak Harbor, Ohio, Kenn writes: No, this isn't another post about a gig with our band. This is just to update a couple of points from yesterday's post about our "Puzzled By Birds" quiz.

In introducing the quiz, we mentioned a similar (but faster!) bird quiz available for iPods and iPhones, but we made a couple of errors. For one, we got the capitalization of the company wrong: it's birdJam, not BirdJam (small b, capital j). Capitalization is important -- just ask the Yellow-crowned Night-Heron, who would be vexed constantly by the many incorrect printings of his name, if only he could read! Secondly, we mentioned that we thought that our friends at that company had gotten the idea for their new "birdJam Twitch" game from our quiz back in January, but they didn't; they had come up with the idea independently. Great minds running on the same tracks (or flying in the same flocks), you know.

We don't have any connection with birdJam; we just know that they're good people and that they make some nifty applications for iPods and iPhones. If you've got one of those devices, or are thinking about getting one, you should check out birdJam's cool apps here.

By the way, a few brave souls already sent guesses for "Puzzled By Birds 2," on the basis of the marginal clues available yesterday! But so far no one has named the bird correctly, so the truth is still, as they say, out there.

Puzzled By Birds 2: Day One

From Oak Harbor, Ohio, Kenn and Kimberly write: Back in January we did a new kind of bird identification puzzle on our blog. It was so popular that one of us (we won’t tell you what her name was) has been suggesting ever since that we should run this kind of puzzle again. It was so popular that our friends over at BirdJam copied it for an app called BirdJam Twitch, which is pretty cool. But our version is free and it lasts longer! So we're proud to present another "Puzzled By Birds" for your enjoyment and / or aggravation.


So here is our next installment of this new kind of bird identification quiz. The picture here is a kind of digital jigsaw puzzle with most of the pieces removed. The original photo was of a bird that occurs regularly in North America. Can you tell, from the pieces visible here, what kind of bird this is? (If you can, you’re some kind of super-birder! Please come help Kenn with finishing his update of Advanced Birding!)

For the next 8 days, we’ll be posting this picture again each day (about 3 p.m. Eastern Daylight time) with a few more of the pieces added. You’ll gradually be able to see more of the bird and its habitat. When you think you know what it is, send us a comment. We won’t publish the comments unless you specifically ask us to publish them when the quiz is over - - but we’ll keep tabs on them, so we’ll be able to announce who was the first to correctly identify the bird. We hope that you’ll enjoy this little challenge and that it will give you a few minutes of interesting concentration on how to identify a bird without seeing all the field marks at once.

Puzzled By Birds: Day Eight

From Birding HQ, Kenn and Kim write: Now we’re on the eighth day of our bird puzzle, and almost the whole creature is now visible. Unless the bird is holding a sign in the tip of its bill that reads, "Hi, I’m a _____ ______," we’re seeing about as much as we’re going to see. So this is the point where the game contestant says:

"I’d like to buy a fowl."

And we fill in the last remaining pieces.


So it’s a bird wading in a marshy area at the edge of water. Its feathers are mostly brown and white, which is not a special combination. But the shape of the bird is very distinctive: horizontal body, long legs, long neck, small rounded head, curved bill that’s thick at the base. What’s more, the legs and bill have a strong pink cast. There’s only one common North American bird that could look like this: an immature White Ibis (Eudocimus albus). The adult is white with black wingtips and with bright red bill and legs, but the young bird is bit less flashy. We photographed this young White Ibis on the Outer Banks of North Carolina in October 2006.

Give yourself extra points, incidentally, if you wondered about the possibility of a young Scarlet Ibis (Eudocimus ruber). That spectacular South American bird can look very similar to White Ibis in its younger stages. But we mentioned a few days ago that our quiz bird was of a species that's common in North America.

If you’ve been following along, we appreciate it, and we hope you’ve enjoyed the challenge of this bird puzzle. And if you haven’t, well, please write and tell us about that, too. We’ll see your comments when we get back to the USA in late January.

Puzzled By Birds: Day Seven

From amid our frenzied packing for our trip, back in December, Kenn and Kim write: Here is the seventh installment of our gradual revelation of our bird puzzle. By now, most of the bird is visible. In fact, we can see almost everything except its face. Ever notice how important face pattern is for identification? But regardless, can you identify this bird? Send a comment if you can. The comments won’t actually appear on the blog until late January, when we return to the States, but at that point whoever got it first will be showered with the admiration and adulation of your peers.

Puzzled By Birds: Day Six

From back in December, Kenn and Kim write: This is the sixth day of our puzzle challenge. Again, we put these posts together before we left the country, since we probably won’t be able to update the blog from our location in the southern ocean. So if you post a comment, it won’t show up until we return to the U.S. in late January. But do send a comment if you’ve decided on the identity of our mystery bird, because we’ll have some nifty prize for the first to identify it correctly.

Puzzled By Birds: Day Five

From Puzzlebird Headquarters, Kenn and Kim write: This is the fifth day of our ongoing puzzle challenge, wherein we fill in a few more pieces of the bird every day around noon. When you think you know what the bird is, send us a comment. We won’t see the comments for a while - - if our trip is on schedule, we’ll be at South Georgia today (not like south of Atlanta, but South Georgia Island, 870 miles east of the Falklands and just south of the Antarctic Convergence). But after we get back, we’ll be able to see who sent in the right answer first, and the lucky winner will receive not only the adulation of your peers but possibly some nifty prize.

Puzzled By Birds: Day Four

From out in cyberspace, Kenn and Kim write: If you’re just joining us, this is the fourth installment of an ongoing puzzle. Every day from now through Sunday, at about noon (eastern time) we’ll reveal a few more pieces of this jigsaw puzzle bird. How many pieces do you need before you can identify it to species? If you really want to challenge yourself, of course, you could go back to the first entry on January 11 and try to identify the bird from the tiny fragments shown there.

Puzzled By Birds: Day Three

From our diabolical secret laboratory, Kenn and Kim write: This is the third day in a row in which we reveal just a little more of our puzzle bird. If you can figure out what it is (and there’s an important new clue revealed today), post a comment to the blog. We’ll check the comments when we get back to the U.S., to see who got it first.

Here’s a hint: this is a bird that occurs regularly in the United States, and it’s even common there in some places. That narrows it down, right? One of about 750 species, rather than one out of about 10,000.

Puzzled By Birds: Day One

From back in December, Kenn and Kim write: If our trip is running on schedule, today we will have left the Falklands to head east-southeast through the wild waters of the South Atlantic, heading for remote South Georgia Island. Communicating from there may be a distinct challenge -- so we thought we’d give YOU a distinct challenge, in the form of a brand new kind of bird quiz.
Here’s a new kind of bird identification quiz. The picture here is a kind of digital jigsaw puzzle with most of the pieces removed. Can you tell, from the pieces visible here, what kind of bird this is? (If you can, you’re some kind of super-birder!)

For the next 8 days, assuming that we got the settings right, we’ll be posting this picture again each day (about noon Eastern time) with a few more of the pieces added. You’ll gradually be able to see more of the bird and its habitat. When you think you know what it is, send us a comment. Your comments won’t actually appear on the blog until we’re back in the U.S. to moderate them, but we’ll know who answered correctly first, and we’ll send you some kind of fabulous prize.

Bird Photo Quiz Quiz

From Birding Central, Kenn writes: Back when "publishing" always involved ink and paper, a Photo Quiz was popular in various bird magazines. A challenging photo (or two or three) would be presented in one issue of the magazine, with the answer(s) to be revealed in the next issue. Birders would study the photos and their field guides, discuss the quiz with their pals, then wait a month or two or three for the next issue to see if they’d gotten the answer right.

Today, in the age of online publishing, photo quizzes are legion. There are literally dozens of "mystery bird" photos posted every week on websites and blogs. Followers of these quizzes wait only days for the answers, not weeks or months. Other things have changed as well: birders researching a tricky photo today are more likely to look for pictures on the internet, and a fair percentage of those online photos will be misidentified or mislabelled. And when the online quiz posts its answer, there’s a chance that the answer will be wrong. So there’s a new kind of edgy challenge to the game.

Quizzes in print have a longer history. In the 1970s (when I was a rabid kid birder) we got our photo-quiz fix by looking at British Birds, a fine monthly that was then publishing more on identification than all the North American periodicals put together. A few of us crazed American and Canadian birders pored over every issue of British Birds, tried to work out the photo quiz, and then eagerly read the detailed answer to the previous month’s quiz. It was such an educational feature that we wondered why North American bird journals didn’t follow suit. But not until 1980 did Birding, the magazine of the American Birding Association, begin to run a regular photo quiz feature (a feature that continues today, by the way). I have warm feelings about the Birding photo quiz because I was in charge of it, writing the answers for almost every issue, for ten years, starting in the mid-1980s. But that wasn’t my first experience with writing photo quiz answers.

We’re not going to add one more online mystery photo to this week’s crop. Instead, we have a different kind of challenge, one that will test your knowledge of photography, publications, and the history of the birding community.

Here’s the question: What was the first publication in North America to run a regular bird photo identification quiz?

If you think you know the answer, or if you want to guess, send us a comment. If no one gets it, we’ll post the answer in a week. (Of course, a week from now is the 24th, and the guys will all be out doing their last-minute Christmas shopping, but ... ) The answer is sort of surprising. To entice you to enter, we’ll offer a prize (perhaps an autographed copy of a rare historical birding publication!).