Pied or White

[Pyrrhocorax]

I need a second opinion from a video, is it ok to post a link to a YouTube video here? I can extract stills, but they wont be very good.

For now I'll just go so far as to risk asking people to do a YouTube search for "Philbull11" or "Which Wagtail"

Thanks for any help

[RobS]

Juvenile Pied?

[Picidae]

Would be helpful to post the stills - especially any of the rump

[Pyrrhocorax]

I'll see if I can extract stills from the vid.

Thanks for having a go.
;-)

[Pyrrhocorax]

This is about the best I can manage by way of stills

[RoyW]

I would agree that this is a young Pied (probably best called 1st winter rather than Juvenile). The rump is not visible in your stills, or on the video (it would be black in Pied, like the uppertail coverts, but the same pale grey colour as the back in White), but the extensively dark grey flanks are a strong pointer towards Pied (more often white or with limited paler grey on White).

[Pyrrhocorax]

I'll go with Pied then. I must admit that having seen a few White in France in the Spring, I would have expected to spot it when I was actually watching the bird.
If I'd even suspected White at the time, I'd have been looking at the bird rather than at a tiny screen

Thanks for the input

P

[Picidae]

Without a good view of rump I wouldn't be confident in assigning ssp 100% - some albas can be quite dark on flanks and this time of year they can be very difficult to separate however, the nape looks quite dark pointing to pied but on other pics there's little contrast (is it the same bird?!) - yellowish tinge on face in some of pics would favour 1w - without clear view of moult contrast, again wouldn't like to age it for certain.

[Pyrrhocorax]

Definitely the same bird throughout. I'd also agree that it's probably a first winter. Nice to know that it's not just me who's uncertain. If I'd registered it while I was there I'd have stayed a bit longer, looked closer and filmed or better photographed it some more.

Hindsight is a great thing

[RoyW]

Originally Posted by Picidae

Without a good view of rump I wouldn't be confident in assigning ssp 100% - some albas can be quite dark on flanks and this time of year they can be very difficult to separate

Can't disagree with that!
I certainly wouldn't be happy identifying one in the UK as a White Wagtail (subspecies alba) at this time of year if it did have flanks this dark though. The percentages of alba individuals that do have dark flanks is considered to be relatively small, whereas it is typical for yarrellii to have dark flanks.