Subject: [Tweeters] Black Headed Grosbeaks and Brown Headed Cowbirds in
Date: Jun 12 09:01:51 2006
From: Whitney H - ms_whitneyk at hotmail.com


So, being a birding novice of one year, I thought I'd take a chance and
share a little of who's been at my "house" this year.

Since I live less than a mile from Discovery Park, it seems that my
neighborhood gets a large amount of transients, many that I see once and
then never again in the yard.

One such visit to my feeder was on May 11th, when three male Black Headed
Grosbeaks stayed for the entire day. They showed up, helped themselves to
the buffet with hardly any trips elsewhere and then flew off for the evening
never to return.

Since then, I've had a pair of American Goldfinchs as regulars this season,
as well as a pair - yes a mating pair - of Brown Headed Cowbirds. I have no
idea who got the privilege of raising THEIR offspring this year.

Sighting of the Pileated Woodpecker have been down the street on a telephone
pole early one morning, and a slow fly-over of a Peregrine Falcon last week
while I was finishing up yardwork around 6:30 pm. We also seem to have a
Merlin that makes appearances as well, much to the annoyance of the large
sparrow and finch communities we have.

A pair of Northern Flickers have offered many hours of fun and mischief all
year long, along with a new pair of nesting Bushtits who love to look in all
the windows by hanging off the mullians.

My husband and I have renamed our yard the "playground", as at least 3-4
times daily like clockwork, you can watch all the different sparrows and
finchs bring their "kids" over to run amok in the yard. One moment there
are maybe 3-4 different birds at the feeder and the next moment you look and
there are about 30 birds all over the place. This might explain why the
resident Anna's Hummingbird has been a bit scarce after wintering in our
yard and only being spotted back here only a handful of times since. Too
much traffic!

Happy days.

Whitney Hartshorne
Lower Magnolia, Seattle, WA
ms_whitneyk at hotmail.com