On Sat, 8 Mar 1997, Kelly McAllister wrote:

[snip..]
>
> I have seen a Merlin in downtown Olympia several times this winter.

local wildlife photographer Jim Pruske goes regularly to the
E.Bay area on his lunch hour to photograph birds..one day while
trying to set up for the Willet, he saw all the birds in the area
head for cover..looking up he saw a merlin in a stoop on a
flock of pigeons..it picked out a slow on and grabbed it from
behind in the are of the back of its neck and rode it down to
the ground...

a few weeks before that, an Evergreen student told me he was
skate-boarding on the sidewalk in the downtown area near where the
RR tracks cross 4th and he scared *a hawk* on a pigeon off the
sidewalk and into the gutter..this occurred a couple hundred
yards from where Jim saw the merlin..

these occurences were in Jan and Feb..haven't heard of any
merlin sightings lately..

Tom