Hasan

Female Gadwall has a striking white belly in flight, ergo this is not a Gadwall

Agreed, though I don't think this is identifiable warblers come to mind given the tail pattern (Yellow-rumped?)

Yes, the white above the eye is alone distinctive.

@Jerry Friedman Not that it really matters, but I'm pretty sure morphology can be used to describe either or both visual appearance and actual form. The first example's use of 'bill morphology' to describe the physical shape of the bill is perfectly valid and doesn't necessarily preclude the use of the word in reference to patterning or color. That said, it's probably more technically 'precise' to use it solely to describe an actual geometric shape and surface, so I'll accept the correction!

"[morphology] includes aspects of the outward appearance (shape, structure, colour, pattern, size)" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphology_(biology)

Confirmed!

Yes, Neotropic. Note the dark lores, small size, long tail, and acute gular.

Here's an easy table I like to use: https://www.birdpop.org/docs/misc/Alpha_codes_tax.pdf https://www.birdpop.org/docs/misc/Alpha_codes_eng.pdf All you have to do is use the 'find' feature in your browser of choice and voila, you've got the banding code, or vice versa.

Both are possible, though Trumpeter is a bit more likely this time of year.

Nelson's would be my guess

Looks like a scruffy Herring with that brownish plumage, bicolored bill, and pink legs

Probably Herring

It's hard to judge size, and the mantle is not as light as I'd expect from Glaucous. I think it's most likely a Herring, but I'd leave this one as larus sp.

@DLecy I think there's a larger discussion to be had about the nature of taxonomy and its inherent incompatibility with the way birders identify birds. I remember a discussion within my local RBA group a few months back about white at the base of the primaries on Spotted Towhees- that where Eastern is the default, almost all (or at least a majority of) vagrant Spotted have white at the base of the primaries, a decidedly Eastern trait, and one quite rare in the general Spotted population and almost nonexistent west of the plains. Thus, one might propose that nearly all of the Spotted Towhees in my area are in fact hybrids, or at least have some level of backcrossing making them not 'pure'. Given the breeding range overlap, I imagine there's a good chance this is actually a true proposition, but does this make every single Spotted-type bird uncountable? And, considering that physical features are not often a good representation of the percent makeup of either species (a backcross with 25% of one species could feasibly look very similar or nearly identical to the 25% parent), would we truly be able to have confidence that even a bird without white at the base of the primaries is actually a pure Spotted? It's likely that the 'true' identity (whatever that means) of many 'cassiar-type' Juncos is unknowable, just as it's probably unknowable exactly how pure vagrant Spotted Towhees are. Either way, I've always been of the mindset that if it quacks like a duck, call it a duck and move on. And use the slash option sometimes.

With those long narrow wings and the large head this would be pretty easily identifiable as Bald even if we could only see the silhouette

This seems fine for Common, Boat-tailed has a longer tail than this.

"Many [reports of cismontanus] refer to brownish Slate-colored Juncos, while others show pronounced Oregon-like characteristics that suggest recent hybridization. Classic, black-hooded, gray flanked Cassiar-like males are reported in the east far less often." From the Peterson Reference Guide to Sparrows of North America. "... a well-marked male Cassiar Junco like this one is subtly distinctive. In its overall grayness, the bird closely recalls a Slate-colored Junco, but the darkness of the head, breast, and nape approaches that of a male Oregon Junco, creating a more striking contrast between the "hood" and the rest of the upperparts than is visible in any but the very blackest of male Slate-coloreds. More significant than the colors themselves is their distribution: the blackish nape is sharply set off from the grayer or brownish back, and the dark of the breast meets the paler gray of the flank and the white of the upper belly in a welldefined straight line, where the white underparts of a Slate-colored Junco curve up " https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2323&context=nebbirdrev I'm no expert on the morphology of juncos and it's surprisingly hard to find any info on what exactly, in a strict sense, cismontanus even means, but my understanding and the consensus on the actual scientific articles (not bloggers or forum posts) is that a true, classical 'Cassiar' or cisamontanus is very Slate-colored-like with a slight hood. Like this: https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/152939621#_ga=2.121623435.269253878.1614787027-209356072.1610052628 As I think Tony has mentioned before, the way in which eBird organizes the taxonomies of DEJU is not helpful, as basically anything existing anywhere between Slate-colored and Oregon is categorized as cisamontanus, regardless of whether it really is or not, including any range of hybrids or intermediate birds. The birds you linked certainly lean a bit towards the Oregon side of things, but it's certainly an open question as to what we can actually call them. That said, if we're defining male cismontanus as an intermediate between Oregon and Slate-colored but with slate gray flanks, (and the extremely dark, defined hood seemingly necessitates them as male), then by definition we cannot call those two birds cismontanus, and they must be some hybrid or other miscellaneous combination. Females, on the other hand.....

I could be wrong, but how could paleness be an indicator of salmonella? That would require a complete molt after contracting the disease for it to be noticable

Despite the way in which eBird chooses to categorize things, I believe cismontanus refers to a bird with Slate-colored plumage but a clearly defined hood. This is definitely not Slate-colored plumage, hence it's not cismontanus. I agree with Oregon.

I've once had Bendire's in a city park within the Phoenix area, so it's not beyond the realm of possibility. However, my musings were largely for the sake of argument. This is pretty clearly a Curve-billed.

If anything, Bendire's would be the bird to eliminate here; juvie Curve-billed can look almost identical to Bendire's, and I don't know off the top of my head that we can eliminate it purely based on field marks (though the bill looks long), as this looks fairly young given the markings below. That said, location location location. Bendire's is not typically a bird of suburbia, and (I suspect, though not sure) Bendire's would probably be rare this time of year in this location.

As Jerry points out, Crissal is not so much a suburban bird as Curve-billed is. But that's ignoring the elephant in the room (not to mention the other field marks)- Crissal has a rufous vent where this bird does not.

Common Merganser.

Yes, Clark's

Range is not super useful when it comes to rare hummingbirds. Though Costa's is generally a desert specialist, consider that Michigan alone has records of Mexican Violetear, Berylline Hummingbird, and White-eared Hummingbird, all species that are rare in the entire US, let alone Michagan.