[obol] Re: Evening Grosbeaks in the western Oregon lowlands

From: "Karl E. Schneck" <keschneckdds@xxxxxxxxx>
To: llsdirons@xxxxxxx
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2015 09:45:49 -0700

Here's a couple drinking in my yard last Saturday:

On Tue, Oct 20, 2015 at 10:46 PM, David Irons <llsdirons@xxxxxxx> wrote:

Greetings All,

For about a month or so now I have been regularly hearing calling Evening
Grosbeaks around the northern end of the Willamette Valley. This past
weekend while in Eugene, Shawneen had a flock of 50 Evening Grosbeaks pass
over Dan and Anne Heyerly's house just north of downtown Eugene. We looked
at recent eBird reports of Evening Grosbeaks and found that the number of
valley floor reports this fall is about equal to the total number of valley
floor reports for all previous fall seasons. By all indications this fall's
lowland incursion of Evening Grosbeaks is highly unusual and perhaps
unprecedented in recent years. I can't recall ever seeing or hearing as
many Evening Grosbeaks in the Willamette Valley lowlands during fall. The
big numbers here typically come during April and May and they are mostly
absent from the valley floor most of the rest of the year.

If you are an eBirder, I encourage you to record all sightings of Evening
Grosbeaks this fall. This incursion, along with the lowland incursion of
Mountain Chickadees may be an early indicator of other finch irruptions
into our region this winter. On a lesser scale, there have been several
lowland reports of Townsend's Solitaires, including one that visited Wilson
Cady's feeder just yesterday. Further, Pine Siskins seem to be arriving in
big numbers as well. Jim Danzenbaker sent us a photo tonight showing about
fifty Pine Siskins on the deck of his home in Battle Ground, Washington.

One last thing to pay attention to. Over the past year or so, I've noticed
that nearly every Western Red Cedar I see has dead foliage. I'm not sure if
this drought-related or perhaps a disease of some sort, but in recent
months I have been hard-pressed to find a Western Red Cedar that looks
healthy. Even in Olympic National Park and in the Olympic National Forest,
the cedars have lots of patches of brown foliage. The most intense evidence
of this is a broad elevational band (between about 2000 and 3000') along
Hwy 58 east of Oakridge where nearly every Western Red Cedar is
dead-topped, sometimes for upwards of 40 feet.

Dave Irons
Portland, OR

References:
- [obol] Evening Grosbeaks in the western Oregon lowlands
  - From: David Irons

[obol] Re: Evening Grosbeaks in the western Oregon lowlands

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