Subject: Albino Robin and Trumpeter Swans
Date: Jan 4 08:57:50 1999
From: Caroline Feiss - cfeiss at halcyon.com


Happy New Year,

The partially albino robin is still with us, snacking on the viburnum
berries in the neighbor's yard. My question: do albino birds mate or are
they sterile? Are they unattractive to the opposite sex since their plumage
is so odd?

Saturday we spent some hours chasing snow geese in the Skagit. We saw huge
rafts of them, off shore, in the bay south and east of the north end of
Camano Island, before you get to the causeway. We saw none in the Skagit
delta and all our conversations with other birders confirmed few if any
sightings. Trumpeter Swans, on the other hand, were plentiful. In a carrot
field at the northeast end of Fir Island (on Mann Road), Gordy gave up
counting at 350. It was hilarious watching the swans pulling up and eating
carrots. There were so many Trumpeters tooting that it sounded like a
monumental brass section tuning up.

Caroline Feiss
Seattle (Madrona)
cfeiss at halcyon.com