Subject: [Tweeters] Umtanem canyon 'Mockingbird'...
Date: May 17 23:18:17 2005
From: KENMKMAN at aol.com - KENMKMAN at aol.com


Wow, Tweeters, thanks for all your enthusiastic responses to my [most likely]
'MOCK' mockingbird sighting!!! I appreciate all your feedback. I moved here
from Los Angeles over six years ago, where mockingbirds were a common street
bird, and black-headed grosbeaks were numerous in any area around the city that
had sufficient cover, and water. This is what I suspect about my
sighting....It was two different birds. The bird that sang, and the bird that flew. What I
remember about a black-headed grosbeak song was that it's very sweet, and
liquid, not ear-splitting and rowdy, like the one in Umtanem. The bird that flew
from that tree had white wing patches, but was streamlined and gray, NOT stocky
and rust-colored underneath. One poster suggested a Loggerhead Shrike, and I
suspect he's right. Another birder thought the singer was a hormonally
deranged yellow-breasted chat, and, from what I saw earlier that day, that seems to
fit. So, I'm guessing; Loggerhead Shrike and Yellow-Breasted Chat...NOT a
Mockingbird. ....Ken McMahon, Seattle mail to:
KENMKMAN at aol.com