Subject: Orange-crowned Warbler and a Warbling Vireo in Tacoma
Date: Apr 29 20:58:37 2004
From: Rob McNair-Huff - rob at whiterabbits.com


I had fun today watching a Warbling Vireo - a first for our North Tacoma
yard - scrambling around our bushes and trees in pursuit of the perfect
bug entree. I first noticed the vireo around 1 p.m., when I was scanning
the bushes and expecting to find a warbler feeding in the bright
sunshine. Instead, I found the vireo scarfing down earwigs and at least a
couple of tent caterpillars on our non-native ash tree. I had to go back
to work a few minutes later, but I still saw the vireo eating insects 30
minutes later in our snowball bush and other bushes just outside the windows.

More fun was had around 6 p.m., as an Orange-crowned Warbler was snacking
in the snowball bush at the same time as the Warbling Vireo. The warbler
was cleaning up smaller insects from the undersides of leaves while the
vireo was probing and plucking large insects from anywhere it could find
them.

Otherwise our yard birds have been pretty pedestrian over the last few
days. Anna's Hummingbirds continue to visit the feeders each evening,
with the bright red males chasing the females every time they show
themselves. Bushtits show up singly rather than in their fall and winter
hordes, and I am keeping an eye out for our first visiting grosbeaks or
tanagers. Nothing to report yet...

--
Rob McNair-Huff ---------- Tacoma, WA
Author of Birding Washington (Falcon Publishing, 2004)
and Insider's Guide to the Olympic Peninsula (Globe Pequot, 2001)
White Rabbit Publishing ---- http://www.whiterabbits.com
Mac Net Journal ---------- http://www.macnetjournal.com
The Equinox Project ------ http://www.whiterabbits.com/weblog.html