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. 

Rook

We visited Ireland in July 2024 and saw rooks a number of times. I did not have my camera. My photos are all by cellphone. 

This rook was photographed on the grounds of Kilkenny Castle, County Kilkenny, Ireland, on July 5. 

Photographed the same day near the Rock of Cashel, County Tipperary.

At the dock waiting for our boat to tour the Cliffs of Moher in County Clare, on July 13. 

Illustration of ssp. frugilegus, the western rook, from Birds of the World. 

Birds of the World describes the rook as a "small-headed, short-legged crow with low-slung belly, loose tibia feathering ('baggy shorts') and tapered pointed bill. [The] nominate race is wholly black, highly glossed with bluish and purplish ...most evident on [the] wing;...distinctive bare whitish area on chin and lores extending to bill base...; iris dark brown; bill dusky toward tip, becoming whiter towards base (making nostrils apparent, enhanced by absence of nasal bristles); legs dark slate-gray." There are two subspecies. The western rook, the nominate ssp. frugilegus, which I saw, is found from western Europe to southern Russia and extreme northwestern China. The eastern rook, ssp. pastinator, is found from central Siberia and northern Mongolia eastwards across the rest of Asia. Rooks nest collectively in the tops of tall trees and the groups of nests are known as rookeries. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Large-Billed Crow

The large-billed crow is sometimes called the thick-billed crow and has a large bill which is the source of its name. There are ten subspecies and I believe I saw ssp. levaillanti which is found from northeastern India and eastern Nepal eastward to western Thailand and the Andaman Islands. This ssp. has also been sometimes treated as a separate species known as the eastern jungle crow. It has an arched culmen which is the dorsal ridge of the upper mandible. The base of the culmen is hidden by a layer of overlapping black rictal bristles. Its glossy black plumage has a purple sheen. I saw several of them in the Eastern Range of Kaziranga NP in Assam, India. I have a bad habit of only taking one or two photos of crows and ravens because they all look the same to me. Then I often find out it is a new species I haven't seen before and I regret not having taken more photos. This was one of those circumstances. 

Illustration of ssp. levaillanti from Birds of the World. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Plum-Throated Cotinga

On February 5, 2009 Judy and I were in Peru with my law partners and their wives. We were staying at the Inkaterra Reserva Amazonica on the edge of the Madre de Dios River near Tambopata National Reserve. I don't recall if we were near our lodging or on our hike into Lake Sandoval when I saw a plum-throated cotinga. I think it was the former. 

This is the original photo.

I just recently cropped it and it is of very low quality.

I have one identifier on iNaturalist confirming it, the third top identifier, but there was also the fifth top identifier that initially confirmed it, then withdrew the identification without specifying any reason. 

Illustration of a female from Birds of the World. 

Illustration of a male from Birds of the World. 

Males and females are highly dimorphic (different looking). The beautiful male is shiny turquoise-blue with a plum-purple patch on the neck. The female has dark grayish-brown upperparts, and lighter brown lower parts. It is found in the upper Amazon Basin, including the southeastern third of Colombia, the eastern third of Ecuador, eastern Peru, far northern Bolivia and part of Brazil. 

Range from Birds of the World.