Caleb,
you got me curious, so I just checked my eBird records. On Feb 13, 2014,
Adrian, Oscar and I found a flock of at least 99(!) Brown-headed Cowbirds
at the Yard Debris Processing Plant east of E.E.Wilson - almost exclusively
males (I found at least 14 there a few days ago). And in late February
2015, I counted around 30 BHCOs at the OSU Dairy Barn on NW Harrison. Those
are my winter high counts in Benton County.
Hendrik
On Mon, Jan 21, 2019 at 8:22 PM Paul Sullivan <paultsullivan@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Caleb,
A great place to look for cowbirds is in large blackbird flocks at dairies
in the Willamette Valley. I have seen a gathering of ~100 cowbirds in a
flock of 100's of blackbirds at a dairy NE of McMinnville. I keep looking
for a rusty blackbird in those flocks.
Paul Sullivan
-------------------------
Subject: A lot of Cowbirds--Corvallis
Date: Mon Jan 21 2019 21:28 pm
From: caleb AT centanni.com
Hi all,
Today while walking out to the Irish Bend Covered Bridge on Campus Way west
of the OSU Campus, I saw something I've never seen before. In the distant
Starling/Blackbird/Robin flock, which typically contains many Brewer's
Blackbirds, a few Red-wings, and no other icterids, I started noticing
small, short-billed birds. I initially wrote them off as Brewer's
Blackbirds
at weird angles, because there were at least five and I assumed that this
was too many Cowbirds to be in one place in the Valley in the winter. I
then
noticed some much closer birds in an Ash tree, and as I studied them I was
surprised to find that at least five were Cowbirds. Turning attention back
to the larger flock, now closer in the grass, I realized that a significant
portion of the blackbirds present appeared to be male Cowbirds. In the next
few minutes I estimated at least 30 in total, way more than I've ever heard
of in the valley in January. Does anyone have input on how unusual this is?
...
Good birding folks,
Caleb Centanni
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