Subject: Re: Pt. Roberts, WA 5/26/96
Date: May 29 05:36:50 1996
From: Don Baccus - donb at Rational.COM


Jack Bowling:

>Sounds like the song of a Cassin's all right. The mantra I use for the three
>Carpodacus finches songs refers to the loudest and strongest "key" phrases of
>their respective songs:

>If it happens at the beginning, it is a Purple; middle it is a Cassin's; at
>the end it is a House.

Curiously, I've used pretty much the same heuristic when describing
how to differentiate the three songs to groups I've led. I've seen
many, many Cassin's Finches as I spend a bunch of time in dry-side
forests in Oregon and, of course, band hawks at 9,000 feet in the
Great Basin where this finch is our most common migrant finch.
The visual description sounds good to me, too.

- Don Baccus, Portland OR <donb at rational.com>
Nature photos, on-line guides, at http:://www.xxxpdx.com/~dhogaza