*
Alan Contreras found Red Crossbills in alders on the Coquille Valley CBC a few
years ago. At the townsite of Prosper I believe. It probably happens more often
than we think. They are remarkably quiet when feeding. Tim Rodenkirk and I
found them 10 or 12 feet off the ground feeding in pines a block off Hwy 101 on
the Port Orford CBC. It was by accident, as I was pursuing the calls of
Red-breasted Nuthatches. The Crossbills never made a sound, and their greenish
plumage on a very sunny day at noon was admirable camoflage. lpn
On Jan 19, 2018, at 1:06 PM, marty bray wrote:
We found Bill Tweit's article about crossbills in ebird Pacific NW to be
informative. We have continued to see small flocks of Red Crossbills in
Beaver Creek Natural Area and Ona Beach State Park (Lincoln County) for the
past few weeks, although there seem to be fewer birds than in November and
December.
In addition, and to our surprise, on two different occasions (1/7/18 and
1/15/18) we observed flocks of Red Crossbills (15 and 11 respectively)
extracting seeds from female red alder catkins at Beaver Creek Natural Area.
In both instances, we heard the flocks fly in and watched them land in the
alders, where they proceeded to feed silently. If we hadn't heard them fly
in, we probably would not have detected them. Unfortunately, we weren't able
to get a recording to determine which red crossbill Type they were.
Cheers,
Marty and Jeannie Bray
On Thu, Jan 18, 2018 at 9:36 AM, Robert O'Brien <baro@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Well, to quote a well known OBOLer
It's not what you don't know that gets you in trouble, it's what you do know
but is wrong.
In talking to Russ Morgan about his recent experiences with crossbills at Ft.
Stevens,
http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S42038371
http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S42038442
All the birds he saw and photographed were in Sitka Spruce. (& great photos
they are).
So, my impression that the spruce cones had dropped their seeds by now is
clearly wrong.
And..........seems that Wayne's explanation that these flocks were
segregating themselves by
preferred/evolutionary seed sources is given a lot of support.
Bob OBrien
(Science is always right................. sequentially)
===============
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.
