Michael Sanchez was organising his new digital camera to seize a waterfall at Oregon’s Hug Level at dawn when he noticed just a little chicken hopping round. He snapped a couple of pictures, and didn’t suppose rather more of it.
Every week later, these snapshots have made him the star – and the envy – of the native birding neighborhood. Sanchez, who’s from Vancouver, Washington, could have inadvertently captured the primary pictures of a particularly uncommon blue rock-thrush in North America.
The species, which is native to east Asia, has solely as soon as earlier than been noticed on this area, in 1997. However that sighting was rejected by the American Birding Affiliation. If Sanchez’s pictures are verified by native and nationwide birding teams, he may very well be credited as the primary particular person to efficiently file a blue rock-thrush within the area.
“I used to be very very stunned to see simply how stirred up this received of us,” he stated. “It’s mind-blowing.”
Sanchez, a center college band director and musician who very not too long ago took up pictures as a pastime, had by no means thought-about himself a lot of a birder. However as he was reviewing his pictures from his journey to the coast, it struck him that the lovable chicken he noticed was uncommon – he’d by no means seen something prefer it earlier than. “So I believed, I’ve received to publish it on the socials, proper?” Not lengthy after, a buddy of a buddy – an avid birder – reached out. From its distinctive blue and chestnut plumage, the chicken seemed distinctively like a male blue rock-thrush. It turned out, Sanchez could have set a birding file.
“Plenty of instances when one thing like this occurs, there’s a variety of effort among the many birding neighborhood to attempt to confirm it, as a result of everybody needs to go and see it for themselves,” stated Brodie Cass Talbott, of the Chook Alliance of Oregon and the Oregon Birding Affiliation.
Volunteer specialists have been working with Sanchez to confirm the picture and ensure its location. No different native birders have been capable of spot the chicken since Sanchez photographed it – however oddly, there was one other blue rock-thrush sighting 4 days later, on the Farallon Islands off the San Francisco coast.
It’s unclear whether or not this was the identical chicken or one other chicken. As Sanchez’s pictures made rounds in on-line birding teams, one other particular person reported seeing what could have been the identical blue rock-thrush in January, however was not capable of take a photograph.
It’s doubly unsure how this chicken even made it so removed from its house, to North America. “Possibly this chicken individually simply has defective navigation,” stated Cass Talbot. It could have gotten misplaced, after which trapped in a powerful wind system. Or it could have hitched a experience on a ship.
Normally, when ultra-rare, non-endemic chicken species flip up on the west coast, they are typically seabirds, noticed far off shore. “That’s a part of why it’s been such a giant story right here, and folks have been so enthusiastic about it,” he stated. “It’s simply kind of mind-bending.”
The implausible sighting has been a reminder of how sudden and interesting birding could be, Cass Talbot added. “It’s all the time neat for us to see how massive the world is and the way unimaginable these creatures are.”
Sanchez agrees. He wasn’t a birder earlier than, however “this actually has opened my eyes,” he stated.
“I assume I’m a birder at this level,” Sanchez stated. “I feel I’m within the membership.”
