Dear All,

Many, many thanks to all those who contributed to find an identity for
the strange green Tree Pipit seen on the Ngong Hills, alongside a
normal Tree Pipit.

I have attached the thread of correspondence showing peoples arguments
for and against the identity of the bird being an Olive-backed Pipit
or Tree Pipit.

It makes for a very interesting and educational read, and the final
conclusion is that this was a very, very strange bird, and specific
identity will always be a mystery.

What I have personally learnt is; if there are two rarities around at
the same time, make sure each receives fair attention! A green Tree
Pipit might be just a green Tree Pipit. Not everything seen can be
labelled (certainly something that I have already learnt from not
being able to identify many Aquila Eagles). All Tree Pipits in future
will require more than a casual glance. Olive-backed Pipit is not an
impossibility to appear in East Africa one day. That there are
instances of wild hybridisation of Pipits, including three involving
Tree Pipits (see attached details). That Killian’s method of colour
sampling on the computer using the photo programmes eye-dropper tool
is a brilliant idea, (providing the images were taken with identical
settings etc). Finally I really don’t want to see an identical bird to
this one again!

Again many thanks for this educative trail,
Brian