Hi Bill & All,
Bill, guess you must have been having too much fun birding when the
topic of Anna's Hummingbird range expansion in western Oregon got tossed
around on OBOL and the MidValley birding list a couple of weeks ago, but
anyway this seems like a good chance to give an update.
As part of that discussion, I asked folks in rural parts of the
Willamette Valley to send in notes regarding their experience,
particularly if they *don't* yet have Anna's Hummingbirds as regular
yard birds, and I'd attempt a summary.
I received a very good response so I'm still sorting through these and
trying to figure out the best way to produce visualizations that show
the evolution both "absence" and "presence" data over time. Possibly
this will end up as an article for Oregon Birds, if the editors want it,
or else on a website that allows graphics.
But just to give a quick summary, the general picture so far seems to be
of three main stages which have overlapped in time, as a function of
distance:
(1) the larger cities and towns such as Salem, Eugene, and Corvallis
were occupied fairly quickly,
(2) smaller towns eventually developed their own "satellite" colonies,
though some of the more outlying towns (like Falls City) took a bit
longer;
(3) eventually smaller villages/hamlets or other clusters of rural
residential development (RR5 etc.) began to see Anna's hummers
regularly.
A fourth stage of the process, still ongoing, seems to be for Anna's to
become established in "truly" rural locations (residences on farms well
outside of towns or RR5 type of situations), and in suitable habitat
away from residences.
So far just about everyone I've heard from who *doesn't* have resident
Anna's Hummingbirds is in one of these "truly" rural locations.
The shorter version of all of this, as Darrel Faxon put it, is that "the
bird still seems to be a city slicker."
City slickers or not, the Anna's Hummingbirds at our place are hungry in
this cold weather, gathering around our feeder and bickering just like
relatives at the Thanksgiving table.
Happy Thanksgiving everybody!
Joel
Bill Tice wrote:
.... This leads me to ask the question about
Anna's Hummingbirds – I seem to get the idea that their range
has
stretched as well. I live in Falls City, and up until maybe 5-6
years ago, I had 2 records of Anna's at my place, here at the
base of
the coast range. Now they are year round residents, although my
feeders may keep them here. Roy Gerig and I saw one once near
Sugarloaf Mountain, half way to the coast. I'd like to know what
others think.
Bill Tice
--
Joel Geier
Camp Adair area north of Corvallis
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