[Birdtalk] A Yellow-shafted Mystery

[kristinpurdy at comcast.net]

I need help solving a yellow-shafted flicker mystery. For the second time in 3 weeks, I saw a flicker today that really grabbed my attention. The bird was clearly, strongly, undeniably yellow-shafted. However, its head did not show the markings of a Yellow-shafted Flicker. 

The bird's head was marked like that of a female Red-shafted Flicker. In other words, both a red or black malar stripe and a red nape crescent were absent. The body, however, was marked like a Yellow-shafted Flicker--strong, bright yellow under the tail and yellow under the wings when the bird flew. And I got a good look at the yellow color. 

If I didn't know Gilded Flickers don't occur in Northern Utah I'd be sounding the midnight bark, as my husband says; informing birding friends by phone of the rare bird. But due to the possibility of a hybrid, I'm simply raising the question.

Yellow-shafted Flickers in juvenal plumage show the malar stripe and nape crescent, so I ruled out the possibility that this could be a young bird that hasn't yet gained the "regular" colors. So...what did I see?

I got two good looks at the bird, separated by a strafe of the flicker by my first MERLIN of the year. The flicker stayed in the area, though, so I was able to relocate it and look again. What I didn't know to look for was the subtleties of barring on the back and lower belly/legs and face color that Gilded Flickers show. I do remember that the bird appeared to have a brownish malar marking similar to the crown color as female Red-shafted Flickers have.

If you have any ideas about this/these birds, please reply. 

I've hatched another theory about the presence of Yellow-shafted Flickers or hybrids in the Weber and Davis communities between I-15 and the lake--that there are higher numbers of these birds there. A couple years ago, Bruce Robinson's son saw one out in Hooper and a colleage of mine saw one in West Weber around the same time. My two recent sightings have been in Clinton and Farr West. 

Kris
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