India - Plover

[okaugust]

In 2017 I was lucky enough to spend about 5 1/2 weeks in India for work, and got a fair amount of birding in. I did the best I could to ID what I found and had a local group there for some help, but from time to time my sightings get flipped to unconfirmed on eBird, and I have to go back to the drawing board. I've had a handful of species change names, for instance. I thought these were Kentish Plover and stood as such for six years now, but a little research seems to turn up that in April of this year the Kentish Plover was split back to Hanuman Plover, something that was merged decades ago.

https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/hanuman-plover-bird-reinstated-as-species-after-86-years-study-3961689

So I go into eBird, delete the species from the list then go to add it, thinking it's the only logical alternative, and find the only plover available to select is Little Ringed Plover, and to me this doesn't look like a Little Ringed, even in non-breeding plumage. The older have the yellow eye ring, and the younger seem to have more yellowish/orange legs. Hanuman isn't even an option to add as a rare bird. So I defaulted back to Kentish for now, which is rare supposedly and would've cleared that check years ago, and it's possible I got help with the ID at the time from local birders. I really wasn't there long enough and it's been long enough ago that I don't have a grasp on possible options here. Any help is greatly appreciated.

May 12, 2017 Himayat Sagar Lake Ranga Reddy County Telangana

 

[Quiscalus quiscula]

EBird hasn't updated its taxonomy yet. It's definitely a Hanuman Plover, previously Kentish. I'd just leave it as Kentish Plover for now.

[okaugust]

Whew, thanks so much! I'm glad it was what I hoped it was. 🙂