It’s easy to forget sometimes how recent an addition the lovely little Inca Dove is to the avifauna of the US. The species didn’t arrive in Arizona until the second half of the nineteenth century, but in the last century and a quarter it’s become a familiar sight and a familiarer sound, especially in cities and suburbs where its sweet “no hope” echoes above the traffic noise.

At various times this dove and its South American cousin, Scaled Dove, have been considered conspecific. I’d never really given any thought to how to tell the two apart, but backed myself into an uncomfortably edgy corner the other day by identifying a photo as “obviously” that of an Inca Dove. Just how do you distinguish silent Scardafella doves?

HBW to the rescue! According to the Handbook of Birds of the World, the fore edge of the folded wing is white on Scaled Dove, the patch formed by the white outer vains of the foremost wing coverts; this is visible in the painting in HBW, but not so obvious in the photos I’ve seen. The underparts are also paler than on Inca Dove, and the basal portion of the primary flash of Scaled Dove is blackish rather than rufous. There’s a hint, too, that the tail pattern differs subtly, but that will have to wait ’til I can get to a museum.

Meanwhile, here’s a dignified-looking Inca Dove from just across the border in Sonora. It’s not much of a portrait, but it does give a sense of just how tiny these birds are.

Inca Dove, Sonora

Uninhibited by Bills, the Cardinals Soar!

Hard to come up with anything better than that!