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Here's another that has me puzzled The white throat and yellow rump would seem to indicate a whitethroated canary





but what about the streaked chest, which is more like a female yellow canary ... Which has me wondering, which? Or neither? Seen at WCNP on 24 May 2012.

Streaking can often be observed on all canaries that do not normally show streaking... It may be due to the bird being juvenile, it may be due to moulting or a cycle in the breeding season. So, don't let streaking per se put you off a perfectly good ID!

Here is a good example of a streaked WTC.

Thanks, JvR, WTC it is!

Um - at a bit of a loss here. Red-capped Lark? Seen Kruger south of Satara June2012.

It looks a bit like a cisticola to me, but the pic is a bit low on information. If the original pic is of a higher resolution, PM a link to me and I'll have a proppaganda...

I still stand with my previous comment

DD is quite correct. The only things you can say for sure are:
1. It is a Cisticola, not a Lark
2. It is likely to be a Rattling Cisticola but is impossible, from the picture, to say with certainty.

Many thanks DD , JvR and deefstes for your input. Unknown Cisticola for now.

Believe me, I have plenty of Unknown cisticola's in my photo folders

Oh good .. . . I mean, oh dear the poor things

I too have a growing collection of 'unknown cisticolas' — to which these may be added. I try and try to distinguish between greybacked and Levaillant's cisticolas and invariably get them wrong, so .... Are these (which may or my not be the same bird) Levaillant's? See along Darling Hills Road on 31 May 2012.

I don't think it's the same bird, arks, but it is pix of the same species. Why did you pick Levailant's? How would you distinguish GBC from LC considering the features you can see in your pics (plain rufous crown, Buff-brown margins to black mantle feathers, rufous wing panel and even tail shape and length?)

Thanks, Johan. I think that my field guide (Newman) doesn't tell me enough detail Perhaps that's why I invariably get it wrong? I thought that these birds had backs that are more black than grey and my book shows the Levaillant's as have a more solidly clear rufous head than the greybacked ... and I don't see any noticable difference on the Newman's drawings in the tail length and the rufous on the wings.

(OK, so may be I need a new/better field guide?)

Nothing wrong with Newman's ... its illustrations of these two species are spot-on. All of the features I mention above are shown there. I'm just not sure if my cryptic answer had the desired outcome namely to have you go back (to your NEWMAN's) and compare the two cisticolas, then re-evaluate your (originally correct) ID based on these clues/tips!

The idea was for you to make the ID based on those features, then you shouldn't battle again in future when you encountre these specific birds seeing that you will understand and know those points on which you can base a correct ID everytime.

You mean I've finally got it right?!? It's just that I'm SO lacking in confidence when I try to ID cisticolas, and in the past I had often/usually gotten it wrong. So glad to understand now that I am finally making some progress ....

Thanks, Johan, for never making it easy, that's the best way for me to learn!