This morning I returned to the location where I found the family of Black Phoebes yesterday. After walking up and down the river I refound them near where I had last seen them. Though they stayed across the Arkansas River and a few hundred feet away much of the time, the parent bird did bring them over to the side on which I was standing which is where I got the last pic on this post.
As I was getting ready to leave around noon the adult brought the fledglings across the river and into the trees lining Sell's Lake. I got the other 4 pics of them there, taken through the chain link fence that surrounds this privately owned pond adjacent to the Canon City Riverwalk.
These photos, taken much closer than those I posted of the fledgling yesterday (they were well over a hundred feet away on the other side of the river) provide better views not only of the rusty (also called cinnamon) edged/tipped wing bars but also the buffy (some call this rusty or cinnamon) tips to feathers on their upperparts (specifically their wing-coverts, primaries, and secondaries) and a light brownish tipping to feathers of lower back, lower scapulars, rump, and uppertail-coverts. All of these photos (since all appear to show the same feathers coming out it seems likely these are all of the same bird) show a feather that is likely molting from around it's right wing.
Also these photos show another feature distinctive to Black Phoebes in juvenal plumage: their tail feathers (rectices) are not as rounded as those on adult birds. SeEtta
Black Phoebe fledglings: more photos
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