Stefan, Joshua, et al. -
Thanks to several of you who wrote about your experiences with starlings imitating Western Wood-Pewees. The reason why I thought this might be an actual pewee is that I?d been listening to Starlings imitate them a couple hours before. With those, some more typical starling sounds inevitably came from the same location. With this pewee call, there were no other starling sounds coming from the blackberry thicket.

Of course it seems more likely than not I was fooled given the early date. I?m looking forward to hearing the ?train coming out of a tunnel? imitation!

John Bishop
Vancouver, WA

> On Apr 2, 2017, at 10:13 PM, Stefan Schlick <greenfant at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi John,
>
> Along with Swainson's Thrush and Willow Flycatcher, Western Wood-Pewee is often a species that gets reported early. I would err on the side of caution here as I have heard almost perfect imitations of a Western Wood-Pewee rendered by a starling. I even watched the starling do it. It seems like something they seems to start doing in early spring/late winter. I also once got tricked by a starling doing a good rendition of a train coming out of a tunnel, and also a winnowing snipe and a California Quail. I'm sure that there are more species that they have managed to do.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Stefan Schlick
> Hillsboro, OR
>
> From: portland-area-birds at googlegroups.com <mailto:portland-area-birds at googlegroups.com> <portland-area-birds at googlegroups.com <mailto:portland-area-birds at googlegroups.com>> on behalf of John Bishop <bishopjg at earthlink.net <mailto:bishopjg at earthlink.net>>
> Sent: Sunday, April 2, 2017 7:31 PM
> To: Portland-area Birds Birds
> Cc: tweeters at u.washington.edu <mailto:tweeters at u.washington.edu>
> Subject: [PortlandAreaBirds] Western Wood Pewee
>
> At Steigerwald NWR today I think I heard a western wood pewee. I felt pretty confident at the time, I played its calls as I listened and it seemed extremely similar to "calls #1_CA" in the Sibley App. A couple hours before I noted starlings imitating western wood pewee, but still in a starling voice. The putative pewee didn?t sound like a starling, and it was coming from the big blackberry thicket north of the footbridge on the west end of redtail lake. Never saw the bird, though I saw a bird briefly that could have been it.
>
> When I got home and looked on e-bird I saw that this would be one of the earliest ever reported in the region. One was sighted at Tualatin NWR on April 3 2016, otherwise a few start showing up in the last week of April. So of course I?m wondering now if I was hallucinating.
>
> If anyone is visiting Steigerwald this week please keep an ear and eye out for this bird, it would be interesting to confirm it.
>
> John Bishop
>
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