Saturday 11/17/01 I birded Spokane County. I easily found the staked out
CATTLE EGRET and immature SNOWY OWL south of Spokane. Both were seen from
the Palouse Hwy. The CAEG at the intersection of Weger Rd and the SNOW at
the intersection of Hoffman.

Then I arrived in Cheney at about 9:30AM to look for COMMON REDPOLLS. No
luck. During my search I noticed a MERLIN perching on a pole. After a
couple of hours of walking and driving the streets near the high school, I
headed for Turnbull NWR to look for Redpolls. No luck there, either.
PYGMY NUTHATCHES seemed to be everywhere. And on the wildlife drive at the
refuge, just after the first parking area, an adult bull moose with a full
rack loped across the drive in front of me. He stopped in the woods where I
could view him briefly before he disappeared into the brush. Before I could
get over this, at the second parking area was a cow moose, 50 feet off the
road, in full view, totally unconcerned about me. It was probably 5 minutes
before I spied her calf in the brush nearby. 3 moose at Turnbull. I
wouldn't have believed it!

So I returned to Cheney, knowing that my brief span of bad luck had passed.
By 2:30 I was watching 12-15 COMMON REDPOLLS in a birch tree on Nolan-Brown
St, barely off 6th, very near the high school in Cheney. After a few
minutes, more flew in for a total of about 30 birds. A flock of about 30
PINE SISKINS flew to the tree for a very short stay during the time I
watched the redpolls.

This morning (11/18/01) I left Spokane via Highway 2. Not much to report
from there. A PRAIRIE FALCON perched on a pole at Hwy 283 and 6th Ave as I
drove south of Ephrata, heading for Dodson Road in Grant County. At the
intersection of Dodson and Frenchman Hills Road were 7 TUNDRA SWANS. Also
at this intersection was a beautiful adult HARLAN'S HAWK.

On a whim I headed for Crab Creek Road (actually, it's called Gillis) where
it leaves Hwy 26 near the Adams/Grant County line and headed west. This
road is flooded near the east end. It takes 4 wheel drive to get around the
huge (and deep, I think, puddle). Very soon I had a NORTHERN SHRIKE. In a
mile or two, I stopped the car to see some sparrows, that turned out to be
WHITE-CROWNED and SONG SPARROWS. There was also a single LINCOLN'S SPARROW
responding to the pishing. The light was very good at about 1:00 and this
bird was close. I put the scope on it and noticed that the head was green.
Any part of the head that would have been gray was green.....very green.
While I made pishing and clucking noises to keep the bird's attention, it
would look around, and regardless of the angle to the sun, the head was
green. The lateral crown stripes were streaked black and bright orange.
Has anyone else seen a LISP with a green head or was I just on drugs??

Shortly after the green LISP, I saw a LOGGERHEAD SHRIKE. Before I left Crab
Creek Road, I had had great scope looks at 2 of each specie of shrike. I
had never before seen both species in one day. I used the Sibley guide,
which is very good on shrikes.

It was a fun week end.

Marv Breece
Seattle, WA