On the morning of December 4, 2025 Jon Skinner discovered a Chestnut-collared Longspur at the Fitchburg Airport.
11 December 2025 Fitchburg Airport. Photo by Max Chalfin-Jacobs
Some of Jon’s notes on the sighting:
I arrived prior to sunrise and the dark and overcast morning made it difficult to see the flocks of birds out on the tarmac. I was hoping for a Lapland Longspur but my first few scans only turned up dozens of Horned Larks. I decided to do one last scan before retreating back to my warm car. As soon as I saw the longspur, I suspected (and hoped) it was something much rarer. I attempted to get pictures but it remained pretty uncooperative, flying further away and constantly facing away from me. I flip-flopped on the identification many times as I watched in the field. Could a LALO be this plain? Nothing else could have that dark belly, right? It finally came closer and I snapped a pic of the spread tail as it flew away. This made me feel even more confident about the CCLO identification so I sent the picture to some friends for their thoughts. The bird cooperated for a few more pics and I texted some local birders to give them a heads up before I left to go to work. At work, I reviewed all of my pictures and got some final feedback before I updated my checklist and sent out an alert to the RBA discord
Initial impressions:
When I initially saw this bird, I immediately noticed longspur characteristics including the smaller size (especially in comparison to HOLA) and very short legged appearance. Lapland Longspur is the expected species here in the winter but I suspected it was something else. While it had a contrasting border on the auricular, it wasn’t that dark and the bird also lacked any rufous color on the greater coverts or streaks on the flanks as expected with any type of LALO plumage. The thin white eye-ring was also very noticeable.
Identification to species:
The dark tinges across the belly was the first fieldmark that I started with to eliminate the other longspur species in Calcariidae. No species has this dark belly other than Chestnut-collared Longspur. The other key fieldmark that I didn’t notice until I photographed it was the tail pattern. It had extensive white on the outer rectrices with a dark wedge along the trailing edge. The amount of white easily eliminated both Smith’s and Lapland (both only have white on outer two rectrices) and the dark wedge shape eliminated Thick-billed Longspur, which has more of a dark margin along the trailing edge. Bill size seemed too small for Thick-billed, anyhow.
3 December 2025 Fitchburg Airport. Photo by Jon Skinner
Pending review, this will make the 6th official state record, and the first for Worcester County. Also noteworthy is that this is the first non-coastal record for the Commonwealth.
Current reviewed and accepted records:
| MARC # | Decision | # | Location | County | Arrival | Departure | Observers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1979-004 | A | 1 | Bartlett Farm, Nantucket | Nantucket | 10/25/1979 | 10/27/1979 | Richard R. Veit, Marcia Litchfield (ph), Edith Andrews |
| 1991-012 | A | 1 | Duxbury Beach | Plymouth | 10/23/1991 | 10/27/1991 | Robert Abrams (ph) |
| 1993-025R | A | 1 | Salisbury Beach State Reservation | Essex | 12/31/1993 | 12/31/1993 | Gary Purcell* (ph) |
| 2004-018 | A | 1 | 400 yards south of Lot One, Plum Island | Essex | 12/15/2004 | 12/15/2004 | D. Weaver, Bill Gette |
| 2020-061 | A | 1 | First Encounter Beach, Eastham | Barnstable | 10/31/2020 | 11/4/2020 | Jason Barcus* (ph), Katherine McGaughey* |
Historical records that still need a formal vote:
1876 Magnolia, Essex County. Shot and collected by Charles Wendell Townsend on July 28th. Described by him as a worn male, the specimen was given to the Boston Society of Natural History, which would become the Museum of Science.
1975 North Beach Chatham. Found among a large flock of Lapland Longspurs on North Beach by the group of Goodrich, Nikula, Clem, Bailey, Peterson, Sorrie, and Harrington.