Noticed several posts lately about evening grosbeaks cleaning out people's
feeders. We've only had one evening grosbeak visit this year, but for the
last couple of days have had two black-headed grosbeaks experimenting with
our feeders. This is a first for our suburban Puyallup yard. Interesting to
watch-- they are checking out one of those vertical tube shaped feeders with
little tiny perches that are way too short for their ample round bodies, and
the house finches that own that feeder seem bemused by their attempts.
Finally, one sauntered out on a climbing rose and used its weight to pull it
down to where it could reach the feeder, and of course then it had trouble
with that beak in such a little hole.

Otherwise the swallow and chickadee societies are in the full noisy
twittering stage. Last year we had one swallow box on the south side of our
garage, which had a VG family that hatched one egg but a house sparrow got to
it right before fledging. I seem to have gotten ahead of the sparrows with
some ruthless trapping this year, and have up two swallow boxes and one
chickadee sized box that are rocking out. Our chickadee box has a second
brood on its way. This made me wonder if BC chickadees normally raise two
broods so I looked them up in the "Birder's Handbook" and was surprised to
see a question mark beside a notation for one brood. The intro says the
authors used question marks beside unconfirmed information-- is it really
uncertain that they raise even one brood per year? (I peeked in the box to
be sure we had a second nest going, using a tiny flashlight and standing on
tiptoes on a ladder with one eye as close to the hole as I could get. Next
time get a box that opens. All I saw was moss and cat fir and one grass
blade stuck out at an angle, then the grass turned into a tail a exploded out
past my face. Almost became a casualty of the ladder, and got a major
chickadee scolding for my effort)

Two families of VG swallows coming along. One is close to fledging and the
cheeps are now loud enough to hear from the house. I've been noticing a male
flying in after the female-- wonder, do the males feed the chicks? Never saw
the males near the boxes during incubation. One of the boxes does not have a
classic open approach route, but the female is wonderful at banking through a
mimosa and honeysuckle obstacle course. Kind of makes it worthwhile to sit
on the back deck in the evening. I will vouch that having these boxes
increases the number of swallows swooping by close in to the house. The
entertainment value has almost convinced me to give up the Simpsons' time
slot.

Finally, one family of barn swallows in a, well, barn. Aerial battles
between the forked tailed barns and the dapper violet greens. Finally getting
summertime rufous hummer (Puyallup is definitely not one of their early
stops, in fact this is about as early as I've seen one here), cedar waxwings,
green herons flying to the hatchery, baby robins-- now if I can only find the
towhee nest in the Oregon grape.

Busy time.
-------------------------------------
Name: Jerry Broadus
jbroadus at seanet.com
901-16th. St S.W.
Puyallup, Wa. 98371
206-845-3156
06/25/96
19:50:25