Another Life Bird

I know, i know, this is just a robin, getting a worm, but I didn't take the camera upstairs, alas

This one was not an easy, great-big-hawk-in-your-face kind of thing. Nope, it began months ago with the suspicion that I was hearing another flycatcher under the noisy Willow, and ubiquitous Eastern Phoebe. 

I listened to replays of every Empidonax available in the area, and thought that maybe....just maybe...it might be a Least Flycatcher. Never found a circumstance where I could pick out the call enough to record it though, so I let it go, with maybe next year.

Then, Wednesday while I was gearing up for babysitting, I spent a few minutes in the upstairs bird window. It was rainy and dull, but a little bird obligingly perched right out in the open.

It was a Ruby-Crowned Kinglet kind of affair, but was displaying clearly flycatcher-like behavior and the wrong markings. 

I cataloged every tiny detail of its appearance for detective work later, but I was really hoping that it was a Least.

The computer was useless, but in minutes with the Nat Geo guide, I was sure. Wing bars-check. Right colors in the right places-check. White eye-ring-check. Size, shape, behavior-check.

Life list-check.