[obol] Re: Crossbills and fire rings (Fix)
- From: David Irons <llsdirons@xxxxxxx>
- To: Jude Power <foglark@xxxxxxx>, OBOL Oregon Birders Online <obol@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 30 Aug 2013 06:33:59 +0000
I spent the weekend up in Washington at the Western Field Ornithologists annual
meeting. Over the course of nearly two full days of birding along the central
WA coast (Grays Harbor and Willapa Bay) I saw hundreds of Black-bellied
Plovers, none of which was a juvenile. Guess I've not paid close attention to
the arrival date for juveniles in these parts. I would think they should be
here any time now.
Dave IronsPortland, OR
Date: Thu, 29 Aug 2013 22:44:58 -0700
From: foglark@xxxxxxx
Subject: [obol] Crossbills and fire rings (Fix)
To: obol@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
The Red Crossbills photographed on the rocks at the Dee Wright Observatory and
David Bailey's mention of their using fire rings brought back a memory. In the
summer of 1982 I spent three months tent camping in extreme nw. Montana.
Subalpine fir, Engelmann spruce, western larch, and Boreal Chickadees and moose
were neighbors. I built no fires, but crossbills regularly came to the humble
camp site, where there was the obligatory old fire ring.
One early evening I broke out the Coleman two-burner green suitcase stove and
began to cook some rice. A group of crossbills, including White-winged,
stumbled around in the fire ring about four or five feet from me, eating ash.
As I watched the rice, one of the Red Crossbills flitted to the hood of my
sweatshirt, which I had up for mosquitoes, and began singing. The rice started
to try to boil
over, so I slowly leaned forward to adjust the stove. I straightened back up
on my camp stool. The crossbill kept singing.
At high tide this early evening at Klopp L. in the Arcata Marsh and Wildlife
Sanctuary I looked through a flock of 200 BLACK-BELLIED PLOVERS and saw no
juveniles. It seems to me that they begin to show up in the third or fourth
week of August, but perhaps I'm remembering wrong. Could they have had a poor
year, or is the glut of juvies yet to arrive? Are Oregon birders seeing young
ones yet? One PEC flying over, unseen, was nice, and then across the way a
kilometer or so at the mouth of Jacoby Creek were 180 BLACK-BELLIES, 80
SHORT-BILLED DOWS, 5+ RED KNOTS, and ~5000 peeps, about 10:1 WESTERN SAND/LEAST
BEAST and with ~85% of both species juveniles. A few of the natty young
WESTERNS have begun molting their lower rank of scaps, replacing these
feathers, the darkest anywhere in the plumage, with neutral gray feathers with
delicate darker shaft streaks.
We got no rain out of the Oregon system. Subtropical skies, hot sunsets, and
remarkably thick and humid air, but no precip. We could use it.
David Fix
Arcata, California
40 51 N
124 04 W
Klamath Konundrum
Occupied Gaia
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