[TN-Bird] Re: Bird flocks in 1907

  • From: Bill Pulliam <littlezz@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: TN-bird Birds <tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Tue, 16 Apr 2013 10:36:00 -0500

I might think Cedar Waxwings. Bear in mind that lay people's descriptions of birds are very hard to interpret, and their proclamations that they have never been seen in the area before are essentially meaningless. I've had people say that about things like Indigo Buntings.


I think the biggest clue is in the mention of cold weather having destroyed the fruit crop. A massive freeze event (such as we saw in 2007) would potentially wipe out the wild fruit crop too, especially if it was late enough to get the blackberries. So starving waxwings invading orchards that they normally would not pester sounds like a reasonable scenario to me.

Bill Pulliam
Hohenwald TN

On Apr 16, 2013, at 9:54 AM, Lynne Davis wrote:

Bob found this in the microfilm of the newspaper.  Any guesses?

“Strange Birds Doing Much Damage,” Knoxville Journal and Tribune, June 14, 1907, page 9, “The advent of birds which have never been seen by East Tennessee farmers is responsible for a partial loss of the raspberry and cherry crop, while the greater part of the latter crop had already been damaged by the cold weather. The birds have been coming to this part of the state for the past week and they are so numerous and the damage done by them so great, that shotguns have been used to protect the crops. One grower, a man living in Powell valley, who has four patches of raspberries was forced to keep a man with a shotgun in each patch, and even then his loss was a material one. The birds have never before been seen in the state. They are small, dove colored, and have red tipped wings. Stories concerning the birds have been told all this week by the growers who come to the city, and their visitation of this part of the state seems to be general. Just where they have come from or which way they are emigrating is not known.”

Lynne and Bob Davis
Seymour, Sevier County

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