I've just been receiving the Tweeters Digests for a few weeks now and am enjoying the reports of sightings very much. Guess you'd call me an armchair birder!

Regarding hand-feeding of wild birds, when my husband and I had a home in the western foothills of the northern Cascades near Mt. Baker, Whatcom County, WA, we greatly enjoyed bird-watching in our backyard, which was a certified Backyard Wildlife Habitat (a National Wildlife Federation program). Our property was also certified as a Backyard Wildlife Sanctuary by the WA Dept. of Fish and Wildlife. When large flocks of Pine Siskins arrived Ray was often able to hand-feed them. Over the years we ID'd 29 species of wild birds in our habitat.

Referring to Tim O'Brien's (Elma, WA) report of seeing Trumpeter Swans, on Wed. I heard a report on a local news station (Vancouver, BC) about the many dead Trumpeter Swans (400 last year) at a lake which is located on the Abbotsford/Sumas border--missed the name. The deaths of these swans have been reported for the past six years, and Canada is as remiss as the U.S. in not doing anything about the lead shot, from hunters, the swans are ingesting, causing this terrible death toll. Does anyone out there have any knowledge of this sad situation?

Barbara Fysh
Abbotsford, B.C.
email: raybar99 at aol.com