Greetings Fellow Birders,

I have three time more Fox Sparrows feeding in my back yard this morning than usual. OK so I usually only see one at a time, and today there are three. Two acting pretty frisky darting here and there in high speed chases. I think they may be in love. One is way darker than I usually see.

Thinking about these observations, I came up with 'they must be on the move'. I looked at last year's notes and found that April 7th was the last day I saw Fox sparrows. I will sure miss the little fellows.

Something else I noted for the first time was that I had five species of sparrows feeding at the same time. This might not be unusual but I have never been aware of it before today. White-throated, Golden-crowned, Fox, Song and Spotted Towhee. I first noticed the White-throated in December and one or two of them have blessed me with their presence everyday since. I think the Juncos are on their way out of the neighborhood too. Their numbers are down. Not seen at all today and only two yesterday.

Birding is never dull, with the departure of winter birds comes the arrival of spring migrants. So far I've seen VG Swallows, Rufous Hummingbird, and Osprey.

For the past week or so I have been watching a hummingbird nest. The first few days Mama would leave the nest from time to time but the last couple of days she seemed to be on the nest all the time. Monday morning I looked up at the tree and couldn't find the nest. So I moved to another vantage point and looked again. Still no nest so as I walked under the tree I checked out the trail and sure enough the rain & or wind on Sunday must have loosed the nest from its branch.

You can see pictures at http://www.flickr.com/photos/24984572 at N02/?saved=1<http://www.flickr.com/photos/24984572 at N02/?saved=1>