Subject: Evening Grosbeaks and Band-tailed Pigeons
Date: Apr 28 11:17:35 1998
From: "Alan Bauer (ST Labs)" - v-alanba at microsoft.com


Hello Tweets,

New arrivals continue to pour in this past weekend at the homestead. Late
Friday I spotted a male/female pair of EVENING GROSBEAKS in the cedar tree
below the house. By mid-morning Saturday, more than 30 of them were
over-running the bird feeders. I could hear even more of them on the lower
property, but didn't get around to counting them. Do other folks find that
these birds are one of their most common window-hit victims? I always find
them to be the "fly like crazy first, then look where I'm headed second"
culprits in my yard. As luck has it, they aren't hitting our window hard
enough due to it being rather close so they are just bouncing off and back
in the trees. But the only thing I've been able to stop them with is
handing bird flashing tape on the eave above the window. Even this didn't
stop some of them.

Other new arrival just this morning....at 7:00am as we ate breakfast, a
group of 11 BAND-TAILED PIGEONS circled the lower field, and all settled
into the trees above the feeders. Within 10 minutes, there were some little
feeders with three birds on the roof, three somehow hanging on to get seed,
and 2-4 more on the post. The photos will be spectacular from my vantage
point on our deck 20' away! Are others seeing them show up now as well?

Good birding to you all,
Alan Bauer
Fall City, WA
v-alanba at microsoft.com