I have birded at Cape Arago, Coos where the state park is like one huge
Sitka spruce forest. I have hiked almost all the trails including inland
trails this past month. The crossbills are everywhere although they seem
thickest on the outer coast. In the dense spruce forest away from the
coast I have heard, and seen, less birds but they are definitely there. I
am not sure in these denser stands where there is more competition and tree
crowns are smaller, that there is as many cones as on the more open grown
trees on the outer coast? I imagine the crossbills will go to where the
cones are most abundant and have noticed them more on edges of stands and
on the outer coast where trees have a much larger crown and likely more
cones.
Anyhow, I sort of gave up walking inland because you can't see the tops of
the trees let alone any crossbills, and it was hard to tell just how many
cones were on the trees in these denser forests. I did have a huge flock
maybe a mile inland on the edge of a clearcut adjacent to a spruce stand
that appeared to be all Reds with my wife on one hike. But most inland
hikes into this 150-200' tall forest I just had smaller flocks of flyovers,
only one of which I thought I heard a White-winged. The WW Crossbills I
have mostly seen (one time) and heard (several times) are all along the
road out to Cape Arago between shore Acres and the end of the road where
the number of crossbills has been staggering albeit hard to see them!
Happy crossbilling!
Tim R
Coos Bay
On Wed, Jan 17, 2018 at 9:28 AM, Wayne Hoffman <whoffman@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
This is an interesting article. I would like to provide a little local
perspective on this winter's crossbill distributions.
First, I am familiar with most of the locations where White-winged
Crossbills have been reported to OBOL this fall/winter. They are all
places where the Sitka Spruce are somewhat scattered, either in the open,
or among shorter alder trees and coast pines. The fact that I am not
seeing reports from within large continuous stands of spruce is notable,
but does not necessarily reflect actual distribution. Who birds for
crossbills in closed stands of 200' trees? It's hard to even see whether
there are cones in some of these stands. The spruces in our older stands
are probably taller than the trees everywhere else crossbills were reported
on the 2017 maps. The point of this is that White-winged Crossbills could
well be a lot more numerous on the Pacific Coast, and we are sampling them
only on the fringes of their actual distribution, so I do not put much
weight on Bill's description of this as "collected like waifs after a
storm, in a narrow strip of hospitable habitat bordered by the ocean."
One other point in response to Bob O'Brien's suggestion that Red
Crossbills seen feeding in Coast Pines indicated seed depletion in the
spruces: My explanation would be that the crossbills feeding in the pines
are of large-billed types more adapted to bigger, tougher cones. I am not
good at recognizing the calls of Red
Crossbill types, but birds I have observed this winter feeding in pines
have sounded very different from our usual Type 10s.
Wayne
On 1/17/2018 6:07:22 AM, W. Douglas Robinson <w.douglas.robinson@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Bill Tweit has published an article on eBird NW about crossbills. He asked
me to let OBOL know.
http://ebird.org/content/nw/news/pacific-northwest-
crossbills-in-a-year-of-no-cones/
Doug
If driving to the coast to see White-winged Crossbills seems odd to you,
that's because it is. Incredibly odd. The coastal incursion of
White-winged Crossbills that we have been witnessing for the last several
months is totally without precedent in WA and OR birding records. For
those who are Red Crossbill experts, these last few months have been
equally unprecedented for the number of records of Type 1 and 2 found on
the coast. What is going on?
Check out eBird Northwest for
the
recent note that describes the extent of this event, and provides some
background on why it may be happening. And, while you are there, read
about 2018, The Year of the Bird. Then, go bird the coast to witness this
event, which may be winding down, so go soon.
