Dennis & Tweets,

I spent a couple of hours in Sacajawea SP at the mouth of the Snake R. this morning and saw more than 24 Northern Flickers, often in loose groups numbering up to 8 birds. 2 males appeared to be "Yellow-shafted" and several others appeared to be intergrades, there may have been more which were intergrades, but light was poor and the birds weren't permitting close approach.

Also saw a beautiful dark phase adult "Harlan's" Red-tailed Hawk.

Dennis Rockwell
Kennewick, WA
dennrockwell at surfbest.net
----- Original Message -----
From: Dennis Paulson
To: Tweeters
Sent: Saturday, November 25, 2006 10:32 AM
Subject: [Tweeters] social flickers


I may have written about this before, but I'm always amazed by how social flickers are. I don't usually think of any of our local woodpeckers as social (not counting Acorn, which I don't consider local), but when the flickers come to our two suet feeders, they typically come in a bunch, 3 or 4 individuals at once, occasionally more. They are aggressive, often displacing one another from the feeders with lots of displaying, but they are clearly associated. I wonder if this is an anti-predator evolutionary strategy, just like juncos feeding in flocks. Flickers feed on the ground, so they are surely more vulnerable to predation than our other woodpeckers. It's fun to see all the interactions.


One of the flickers is a male with red-shafted body and head plumage but with yellow (slightly yellow-orange) wings and tail.

-----

Dennis Paulson

1724 NE 98 St.

Seattle, WA 98115

206-528-1382

dennispaulson at comcast.net





------------------------------------------------------------------------------


_______________________________________________
Tweeters mailing list
Tweeters at u.washington.edu
http://mailman1.u.washington.edu/mailman/listinfo/tweeters