While working from a boat on Lake Sammamish today I made a quick check on a
trio of purple martin boxes near Marymoor, boxes that Cecily Way installed a
couple of years ago as part of a Girl Scout Project. While about 100 yards
from the boxes I heard the distinctive call of a purple martin, and I
spotted it flying all over the NE end of the lake. It perched on a couple of
the boxes, but at times it was chased off by a feisty pair of tree swallows.
At one point the martin and a tree swallow took off high in the air to chase
a bald eagle! The eagle actually hurried its pace just a bit.

The martin was slightly blotchy and gray on the breast, making me think it's
a sub adult male. I did not see a female today, but one of the boxes appears
to me to have an old martin nest in it. David Robinson and I saw and heard
this martin for about 30 minutes, around 11am.

Kevin Li
Ballard, USA
kdli at msn.com