Scissor-tailed Flycatcher

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, juvenile

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, adult female

Scissor-tailed Flycatchers are beautiful long-tailed flycatchers who breed in the lower middle part of the country, but can be vagrants, showing up just about anywhere else in the country. One just showed up recently at Sandy Point State Reservation in Ipswich, MA and was seen there as recently as this Monday.

Here are two of Lillian's photos from our new Stokes Field Guide To The Birds Of North America (to be pub. this Oct.). In general, the male Scissor-tailed Flycatcher has the longest tail, the female's is slightly shorter (although there is overlap), and the juvenile's is shortest, relatively speaking since they are all very long--tailed birds. Juveniles have a brownish wash to upperparts, adults are paler on head and breast with dark wings.

One may show up near you, you never know.