Tweets,

I (Rob Conway)wrote:

In a previous house I lived right next to a big patch of salmonberries
and could predict within a day or two when the rufous hummers would
arrive by the date of the salmonberry flowers opening.

Michael Price wrote:

Wowza! Feb 16! That's still nearly three solid weeks ahead of here,
where the earliest ever was a Feb 27 male. There's something really
interesting going on here. Normally north- and southbound arrivals are
earliest at coastal sites, so this is *well* in advance of this coastal
site just to the N. So perhaps Vancouver BC birders are looking in the
wrong place for the northbound migration's first Rufous--maybe instead
of being as far S as they can get in the checklist area down near the
Canada/US border in Langley around Mar 8-15, they should be up high on a
local mountain's south slope
about *now*. Is your salmonberry on a S slope, Rob?

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

Yes, the salmonberries are on a south slope. You can find patches less
than 1/4 mile away on a north or east slope that won't think about
pushing out a flower until early-mid March.

As for where spring migrants first "appear", isn't it more of a question
of where they are first "spotted"? Human population densities and
thereby "birding" densities are much higher along the sound/coast and
the chances of seeing early migrants is greatest when the spotters are
highly concentrated. We birders are nuts if we think we have "the
territory" covered. We can also get pretty set in our ways - going to
the same "great" or "usual" spots, rather than exploring new
territories.

If you look at actual weather patterns in Puget Sound (King County)
you'll find that the earliest "warm" temps often come to the communities
at the edge of the Cascades - Enumclaw, North Bend, and Monroe (they are
also the communities that can get a late season snow!) Perhaps it is
hummingbird "tribal knowledge" that pushes the earliest migrants along
the foothill boundary where early salmonberry flowers are opening?

One last point - remember the dates I list are for first arrivals
(something I REALLY look for). The big "push" of birds (when I can see
5-6 fighting it out for territory around my feeders) doesn't come until
around the first week in March. One bird does not a migration make.

PS Michael - If I were looking for early Hummingbirds in BC I'd be
checking out the area between Linden, WA and Surrey, BC. I have friends
in that neighborhood who live in a "banana belt". They are usually
picking cucumbers in June from a garden they seed directly into the
soil. We're lucky if we can get a cucumber to set here, much less set
and mature at such an early date. Open land isn't the only reason the
greenhouses were put in that neck of the woods!!


Good Birding!

Rob Conway
Bellevue, WA

robin_conway at hotmail.com


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