I'd like to thank Jack Bowling for his comments on juvenile shrike plumage,
following my report of an adult and a juvenile shrike at Magnuson Park in
Seattle. Sorry for this late response, but I have been suffering through
MSN's email problems.

Someone else (the birdbox message still has not gotten to me) confirmed that
the adult was a Loggerhead; at least I assume that the adult bird was seen and
that the juvenile was not?

One of the reasons for my initial waffling on ID'ing the birds was that the
adult looked like a Loggerhead to me, but the juvenile looked more like a
Northern. I presumed they were together and were therefore the same species,
but after reading Jack's message, I think it is probable I saw one of each.
The birds were within 50 feet of each other when I first saw them, but I did
not observe any interactions between them.

The juvenile looked very much like the "juvenile" pictured in the NGS guide.
The color was clearly brownish, the eye patch was indistinct, the overall
nature of coloration was very washed out and blurred, and there was a whitish
"line" over the top of the bill. There was noticable barring on the breast as
well. I did not notice any of the head and nape barring show in the NGS guide
in their picture of the juvenile Loggerhead.

I guess seeing both shrike species in Seattle in April makes up for missing
the pipits that I went looking there for :)

== Michael Hobbs
== Kirkland WA
== MJCT_Hobbs at msn.com