The big story has been the persistence of Black-headed Grosbeaks (above) at the sunflower feeders. They stop off here for a snack during migration at least once every May and August. However, multiple visits during these months are infrequent. We hosted several individuals for a week in May of 2008, and have never experienced multiple visits in August before. This year has been drastically different. Only one May visitor was recorded, but I have seen individuals at least once a week from July 28 through this morning. All visitors were either females or hatch-year juveniles (their plumage is almost identical). Black-headed Grosbeaks are incredibly shy at first, fleeing at the hint of movement (or glare from my telephoto lens), so my success in photographing them has been limited. However, they become accustomed to humans after a few visits. The fact that I've managed to scare off the majority of those that I've seen suggests that several different individuals have come through, and that they're not sticking around for long. I don't suspect that they'll be coming through for much longer, but what a ride it's been so far.
A female Rufous Hummingbird guards the backyard nectar feeder.
A juvenile male Rufous Hummer guards the same feeder from atop a rose tree. Competition for this food source between several Rufous and Anna's Hummingbirds has been very high.
Rufous Hummingbirds are also representing in unusually high numbers. They typically arrive in early-to-mid March, hang around until May, disappear in June (apparently they don't nest locally), return in July, and are gone by the end of September. I began noticing more than usual last month. They've moved on since then (the males migrate ahead of the females and hatch-years) and we've since been inundated with females and juveniles. In conjunction with the Anna's Hummers, they managed to drink down four cups of sugar-water last week. And over this time, they've been vehemently attempting to establish control our two sugar-water feeders. Watching them chase each other around has been entertaining. Their activity has waned somewhat over the past week, indicating that some of the Rufous Hummers have moved southward. But plenty remain and will be entertaining us for the next few weeks.
I had been waiting around for the past month to see Western Scrub-Jay fledglings, and was finally rewarded today. At least two extremely loud hatchlings stopped by this morning with their parents. It was quite a sight. Oh, and did I mention that they were extremely loud? Those crazy jays. While I've been paying much attention to our neighborhood's offspring Dark-eyed Juncos and their Brown-headed Cowbird "brothers" (two of each now, see the previous post for details), I just recently noticed that the adult Juncos are going through their Fall molt. One male is currently missing his upper tail feathers. Yep, the seasons are a' changin'.
A juvenile Western Scrub-Jay ponders its suet feeder perching strategy.
A molting adult Dark-eyed Junco
Lesser Goldfinches (left) are all over the place right now. This was somewhat unexpected, as finches in general typically don't flock until mid-September. But I've heard reports of higher-than-usual numbers of Lesser Goldfinches in Western Oregon and Southwest Washington, so it appears to be a regional phenomenon. Today's tally of 24 was a record for August (the previous high of 15 was established two years ago). Finches are highly unpredictable and it'll be interesting to see what happens later this year. I'm currently seeing about 3-6 American Goldfinches at a time, which is about normal for this time of the summer (these numbers will increase to 30-60 at this time next month). Pine Siskins are scarce right now, although that's about par for the course for August as well. Their numbers tend to uptick in October. Interestingly, I've read recent reports of unusually high numbers of Evening Grosbeaks in the Coastal Range. Since a large number of them move to the valley floor for the winter, some are predicting a large winter irruption. This would be great, as I'm still waiting (patiently) to check them off of my yard list.
American Goldfinches: More on the way soon.
Next month is shaping up to be very busy and exciting. Unfortunately, I'll be crazy-busy with work as well, but promise to find the time to share updates.
No comments:
Post a Comment