Thanks John,

You are probably right about the Evening Grosbeaks. They do fit the description better and are most likely what I saw. I had never seen them in a flock before and not at all in the past few years and I missed them completely in my book search. I can relax now.

Gus

On Dec 19, 2010, at 3:36 PM, johntubbs at comcast.net wrote:

Hi George,

Are you sure they weren't Evening Grosbeaks. They have an ivory/tan bill, lighter bodies than wings and noticeable white bars. Plus, if you saw the bills clearly enough to see the color, you most likely would have seen the crossed bills as being very obvious - and White-winged Crossbills have darker colored bills. Additionally, White-winged Crossbills in our area would be an extreme rarity, whereas Evening Grosbeaks would not be unexpected.

Regards,

John Tubbs
Snoqualmie, WA


----- Original Message -----
From: "George Schairer" <gus at gschairer.com>
To: "tweeters" <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Sent: Sunday, December 19, 2010 2:52:11 PM
Subject: [Tweeters] Possible White-Winged Crossbill on Vashon Island

At our feeder on the east side of Vashon Island Friday morning about 9:30 AM we had a group of five or six birds at our feeder that I'd not seen before. They were smaller than towhees and larger than sparrows, with dark wings with strong white bars, a rounded head and beak that appeared to be tan or yellow. The body was lighter than the wings, but they flew off before I could make out what color. It might have been dusky gold or red. They startled, flew up together into the nearby cedar, then flew away. My wife saw them, too, and confirmed that she saw the prominent white bars on the dark wings. Although they were in the shade with the morning sun on the cedar behind them, the white bars stood out strongly. It appeared that the white bars covered about a quarter of the folded wing vertically and maybe as much as a third of the horizontal length. I noticed them at first because of the strong white bars on the dark wings.

Looking through all my books, the only one I could see that looked like it is a White Winged Crossbill.

Gus Schairer_______________________________________________
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