Hi Nancy,



You probably saw a cowbird chick running its "adoptive" mother ragged.
Although nest parasitism is a common strategy in cowbirds, we actually had a
cowbird family making an honest living near our house this year - a cowbird
mom feeding three kids.



Dave Parent, Freeland, WA mailto:dpdvm at whidbey.com



-----Original Message-----
From: TWEETERS-owner at u.washington.edu
[mailto:TWEETERS-owner at u.washington.edu] On Behalf Of Nancy
Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2004 6:25 AM
To: Tweets
Subject: Strange family



Hi Tweeters,

Yesterday there was the strangest pair of birds on the ground under our
feeder. It was a chick begging for food from its parent. The chick was
three times the size of the parent. The parent was clearly a song sparrow
without a tail, very small and the chick was a pale taupe color with
striping similar to a pine siskin but a huge bird. It was big and also
quite fat. I was puzzled. Would the parent be able to fly properly without
the tail and would she be feeding another birds chick? Or is there another
explaination for this phenomenon?

Nancy

Renton

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