I was going through my Curved-billed Thrasher images this morning, thinking about doing a post. As I was perusing the thumb-nails, five of them caught my eye. I realized that those images were different from all the others. Upon further review, and consulting my bird guides, I discovered it was a Sage Thrasher, (Oreoscoptes montanus).
The Sage Thrasher is quite a bit smaller than the curved-billed, and has a much shorter bill. I should have taken a closer look at them at the time, but as I always do, I download into my folders then nearly forget about them, until I accidentally come across them again, as I did this time, looking for better images of the Curved-billed. As it turns out, it is a lifer for me, as I had never seen and identified one before. We, in this area, are right on the eastern edge of their wintering zone.
Sage Thrasher
This image was captured in January of 2009, at San Angelo State Park. My camera at that time was the Canon EOS 40D. Canon 100-400 zoom lens, 1/800 sec. @ f5.6, ISO 400. Center-weighted metering at aperture priority.
Texas Tweeties by Bob Zeller 