No surprise my photos are nearly Identical and I had no problem uploading two of them to ebird. in the photos the angle of the shot does make them look shorter than they were to the eye, since they are facing towards or away from us. The birds were not really cooperative. In most of my pics they are beak deep in muck.
Jacque Brown.
On Monday, May 4, 2026 at 06:24:43 PM CDT, Ian MacGregor <00000489141846bd-dmarc-request...> wrote:
I was with Jacque Brown at Charlie Craig today. The most exciting thing for me was my first Arkansas Hudsonian Godwit. A few minutes before we came across a couple of dowitchers. We both thought they were Long-billed, but when I tried to add the photo of one of the birds to my Ebird list, Merlin rejected it as a Short-billed. Also in the picture of both, Merlin thinks the bottom bird is Short-billed.
I am including three pictures:, the bird accepted as a Long-billed, the one rejected as a Long_billed by eBird, and a picture of them both together
On the single bird which is possibly a Short-billed, the bill does look short, but I that could be due to the camera angle. In the picture of the two birds together. I don't see much difference in bill length. What a I do see is the bird eBird thinks is a Short-billed has a few larger spots on its wing coverts.
Merin photo id is by no means perfect. So it could simply be wrong, and bit birds are indeed Long-billed, but if one of the birds is a Short-billed, what clinches that id
I am assuming tar Jacque has much better photos.
Ian Sent with Proton Mail secure email.
