Bob,

Funny you should post this today. In my backyard in Everett today I
also had young cowbirds begging for food. One was being fed by a song
sparrow which I have witnessed before but the other one was being fed by
an American Goldfinch. This I had not witnessed before and I was going
to try to look up how common Goldfinches were as Cowbird hosts. A
couple of years ago I had a White-crowned Sparrow feeding a Cowbird as
well its own young White-crowned Sparrow. I gave this bird a lot of
credit for being able to keep one of its own young as well. I wonder
how many nests are able to raise the original young as well as a young
cowbird?

Yvonne Bombardier
Everett, Wa
ravenn at premier1.net

> Subject:
> Cowbird Hosts
> Date:
> Sun, 13 Jul 97 15:49:57 -0000
> From:
> bboek at olympus.net
> Reply-To:
> tweeters at u.washington.edu
> To:
> <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
>
>
> Dear Tweeters,
>
> Brown-headed Cowbirds seem abundant in the Sequim-Dungeness, WA, area
> this year. I'm not sure if there are more than usual, as my sample size
> (no. of observation years) is small, but they do seem very apparent.
>
> In the last four days I've witnessed juvenile cowbirds begging from and
> being fed by two host parents, one time by a Song Sparrow in sedges and
> willows at the edge of a small freshwater stream and one time by a male
> American Goldfinch on a vegetated coastal bluff. You probably know the
> scenario -- big cowbird chick, begging very loudly and persistently,
> seemingly working the host parent to exhaustion. It's real ear-catching
> if you're in tune with bird sounds.
>
> I was thinking that Tweeters might be a good place to make an informal
> survey of cowbird hosts observed this year. What hosts have been seen by
> all you knowledgeable Tweeters folks this year, in the act of feeding
> cowbird chicks or incubating cowbird eggs? Thanks for your input, if
> you're inclined to respond. (This is admittedly not very scientific,
> but, hey, I'm curious).
>
> Bob Boekelheide
> Sequim
>