Greg and Tweets -

Poor sentence construction on my part. I have never seen a Black-headed
Grossbeak in my yard before May 15 - about the same time the Pine
Siskins completely disappear for the summer. The point I was trying to
make is that Cougar Mountain is a pretty "finchy" place year round.
...But when the BH Grossbeaks do show up it is usually in pretty
substantial numbers - actually enough to be very irritating on early
summer mornings - loud guys that they are.

I DID have a Western Tanager today - at least a month earlier than usual
- there aren't even any leaves on the trees yet!! I also have 3 pairs
of chickadees working next boxes - 2 CB and one BC pair, I've never had
more than 1 pair nest in such close proximity in the yard (50 feet
between boxes) in any year. Birds, always new surprises in store.

Good Birding,

Rob Conway
Bellevue, WA

===================================================================


>Date: Sat, 11 Apr 1998 10:55:45
>Reply-To: gtoffic at halcyon.com
>From: gtoffic <gtoffic at halcyon.com>
>To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
>Subject: black-headed grosbeaks
>
>At 10:29 AM 4/11/98 PDT, Rob Conway wrote:
>>.... In the Winter it is not unusual to get 20 or so Purple Finches at
a time in the yard. I also get a lot of Goldfinches, Pine Siskins, Red
Crossbills and Black Headed Grossbeaks and
have seen Redpolls and Evening Grossbeaks in the neighborhood ...
>
>Rob, and other tweeters,
> There have been a couple of references to black-headed grosbeaks on
tweeters in the past few weeks. This really surprises me. One -
because they're not expected in winter, and two because they have been
reported so matter-of-factly, as though they were nothing special. Am I
missing something or are black-headed grosbeaks more common in winter
than I imagine? How many winter records are there anyway?
>
>Greg
>
>Greg Toffic
>Curator of Birds
>Woodland Park Zoo "Black holes are where God
>5500 Phinney Avenue N. divided by zero."
>Seattle, WA 98103
>(206) 684-4836 (Ph)
>(206)233-7278 (FAX)
>


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