American Goldfinch

I saw my first American goldfinch at Big Morongo Canyon Reserve in Morongo Valley, California, on May 14, 2022. It is a species I'd been wanting to see for a long time. Unfortunately, I did not get a good view of it.

We get lots and lots of lesser goldfinches and range maps appear to show the American goldfinch as present throughout California, but that has not been my experience. A year later, on May 12, 2023, I was in Central Park in New York City.  My son Andrew and his girlfriend Michaela, who live in Manhattan, lined up a bird walk for me with Birding Bob, hosted by a substitute, Deborah Allen, that day. Judy came along to keep me company. I saw two Amereican goldfinches and was quite excited about it. The first one, in particular, was a good view.  

The first two photos are the first one and the 3rd and 4th photos are the second one. 

There are four subspecies. The ones in New York were the nominate ssp. tristis, also known as the eastern goldfinch, which is the most common of the subspecies. The California ssp. appears to be salicamans, which is browner than the other subspecies and the male's black cap is smaller than the others. 

The American goldfinch undergoes two molts during the year. During the winter molt it sheds all of its feathers and in the spring, it sheds all but the wing and tail feathers. After the spring molt, the male is a brilliant yellow with a black cap and white rump visible during flight. The female is mostly brown, lighter on the underside, with a yellow bib. 

Illustration of a female from Birds of the World. 

Illustration of a male from Birds of the World. 

Range map from Birds of the World.

Pied Falconet

We spent part of December 2024 in Assam, in northeastern India, in Kaziranga NP. One morning we were driving toward the Burhapahar Range, along the outskirt road, and our guide had the vehicle stopped and pointed to a very small bird standing on a bare tree branch on a hill above the road. He identified it as a pied falconet. How he could spot it and know what it was is beyond my comprehension. 

Pied falconet in Kaziranga NP.

Illustration from Birds of the World.

Illustration, flying, from Birds of the World.

I posted my observation on iNaturalist and got one positive identification from hrishu, the no. two identifier of pied falconets with 15. 

The pied falconet is also known as the white-legged falconet. As the name indicates, it is black and white. The white face has a black patch covering the eye and going to the ear coverts. The upperparts, including the crown, are black. The primaries are black with white wing bar. The tail is black above and black with white splotches on the underside. The sexes are both alike. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Wikipedia has a photo taken in Kaziranga with the falconet standing on a bare branch, very similar to my own photo, but with a much better view of the bird. 

Little Heron

The little heron, with 20 subspecies, is a new species as of 2023 when it was broken off from the striated heron. I saw one at Keoladeo NP near Bharatpur, India on November 26, 2025. 

Illustration from Birds of the World.

The plumage is quite variable, even within the same subspecies. Adults have blue-gray back and wings, white underparts, a black cap, short yellow legs and a dark line that extends from the bill to under the eye. I saw ssp. javanica which is found in India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka to Thailand, the Philippines, and the Greater Sunda Islands and Sulawesi which are in Indonesia.  

Range from Birds of the World.

Yellow-Billed Duck

On July 18, 2025 I was with Judy and my granddaughter, Ella, on an excursion in a wooden boat in the Mabamba Swamp on Lake Victoria in Uganda. Our guide, Wilson, was in the front of the boat and Ella was also in front of me. Wilson identified a yellow-billed duck in front of us and I had a hard time getting a clear view of the duck between Wilson and Ella. I got a couple of photos stretching out over the side of the boat to avoid them but my focus was blurry and the duck flew before we were able to get close enough for a better shot. 

Yellow-billed duck illustration from Birds of the World.

They are mainly brownish gray with a darker head and bright yellow bill with a large black triangle on the upper mandible. They also have a green-blue speculum. The sexes are similar. There are two subspecies. Ssp. ruepelli, the northern yellow-billed duck, and the nominate ssp., undulata, the southern yellow-billed duck. I saw the northern yellow-billed duck, found in South Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, northern Kenya and Uganda, although Birds of the World indicates there are no recent records of it there, although Wilson did not indicate any surprise in seeing it.  A separate note in Birds of the World states that it is very common in southern Africa with more scattered populations towards the north of its range. 

They are non-migratory and found in southern and eastern Africa.

Rock Pigeon

The rock pigeon is also known as the rock dove and common pigeon. Rock pigeon is the wild form of the bird, but the pigeons familiar to most of us are the domesticated forms of the wild rock pigeon. Wild rock pigeons are pale gray with two black bars on each wing. The domestic pigeon, which includes about 1,000 different breeds, descends from the rock pigeon. Escaped domestic pigeons are the origin of feral pigeons and both forms can vary widely in the color and pattern of their plumage, unlike their wild ancestor. As indicated in the range map below, from Wikipedia, the native range is in northern Africa, the Middle East, southern Europe and southwestern Asia. 

I had a domesticated rock pigeon which looks a lot like the wild rock pigeon. I took it from a nest in a barn in my grandparents back yard which was a part of Pioneer Village in Salt Lake City, Utah. I took it to my 5th or 6th grade elementary school class and we kept it their until the end of the school year, feeding it with an eye dropper. When school ended I took it home. It roosted in our back yard and pooped all over our back patio and window sills. My dad hated it. I named it Midge and Midge would stand on my head or shoulder and follow me around, walking behind me. Midge was later killed by a car when she was following (walking) a couple of children as they crossed a street. One of the best pets I ever had. The photo below is of me with Midge in our living room. 

 

Illustration of a wild rock pigeon from Birds of the World. 

Feral rock pigeon near the Concho Riverwalk in San Angelo, Texas. 

Red-Eyed Dove

Judy and I visited the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens in Capetown, South Africa, on May 27, 2018 and saw some beautiful red-eyed doves there.  I posted one photo on iNaturalist and indicated it was a western cape ring-necked dove and got four identifiers who disagreed and said it was a red-eyed dove. Two of them were the top two identifiers on iNaturalist of red-eyed doves, alanhorstmann and colin25, who have identified 4,258 and 1,915 of them respectively. 

The forehead and face are pale bluish gray and merge into a darker hue on the crown; a narrow black band extends from the bill gape to the eye; the neck, breast and underparts are dark mauve-pink to wine-red, with some gray suffusion; the upperparts are grayish brown; the primaries are black; the outer wing-coverts are dark slaty-blue; the flanks, sides of rump and underwing-coverts are bluish gray; the ventral region and undertail-coverts are white; a black half-collar crosses the hindneck; the underwing is dark bluish gray; the iris varies from yellowish to orange to red or orange-brown; the orbital skin is purplish red; the bill is black to purplish black; and the legs are reddish purple or grayish purple. This description is best fulfilled in the photos above, where there was good light, than in the illustration below. 

Illustration from Birds of the World. 

It is found through most of sub-Saharan Africa, except in desert areas. 

Range from Birds of the World.

Yellow-Billed Cuckoo

On July 5, 2025 I was at the Sonny Bono Salton Sea National Wildlife Refuge in Imperial County, California, walking through the trees to the south of the large open field near the visitor center where snow geese are fed in the winter. I saw this bird which I immediately thought looked like a cuckoo in a tree. I kept moving around to try and get a better view of it and the bird kept moving to prevent that better look. It eventually flew away and I had a view of rust on the wing. I posted it on iNaturalist and had one identifier agree with me. I noted that the bill shape and color matched, the white throat and chest matched, I couldn't see white patches on the tail and the tail appeared a little short, but it could be a juvenile and when it flew I noticed rust color which is consistent with the wing panels. 

Illustration from Birds of the World. 

Adults have a long tail, brown above and black and white below, a black curved bill with yellow, especially on the lower mandible. The head and upper parts are brown and the underparts are white. There is a yellow ring around the eye and cinnamon on the wings shows when it is in flight.  Juveniles do have a less distinct undertail pattern and the undertail has gray where it is black on the adult. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Note that California has some small scattered areas where they breed, but it is very small and very scattered and not where the Salton Sea is located.  Birds of the World notes, "Western populations have suffered severe range contractions during the twentieth century, and are already extirpated from British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon. In California, this cuckoo once numbered more than 15,000 pairs, but the population has been reduced to about 40 pairs in less than 100 years, owing primarily to the destruction and degradation of preferred riparian habitat." iNaturalist does show a couple of other sightings near the Salton Sea and scattered other sightings in Southern California.