[birding] Grassland sparrows galore!!!! (plus a few forest arrivals)

[Michael Dossett]

Joel,

While I haven't been home much, I haven't seen the Western Kingbird since Sunday evening, although there has been a Vesper Sparrow singing from the neighbor's brush pile (corner of Wiles and Military Road) for a couple of weeks now.  Glad to hear that you had that many Vesper Sparrows along your ride.  Seems like maybe they are holding on a little bit at least in this part of the county.

Michael


Michael Dossett
Corvallis, Oregon
www.Mdossettphoto.com
phainopepla at yahoo.com


--- On Wed, 4/21/10, Joel Geier <joel.geier at peak.org> wrote:

> From: Joel Geier <joel.geier at peak.org>
> Subject: [birding] Grassland sparrows galore!!!! (plus a few forest arrivals)
> To: "MidValley Birds" <birding at midvalleybirding.org>
> Date: Wednesday, April 21, 2010, 12:12 PM
> Hi folks,
> 
> I'm just back from a bicycle loop around the north side of
> Coffin Butte,
> then up the 400 Road in Dunn Forest and down through OSU's
> Soap Creek
> Beef Ranch to return home via Coffin Butte landfill.
> 
> The most exciting part of the ride was finding 22 CHIPPING
> SPARROWS and
> 9 OREGON VESPER SPARROWS, along with about 20 SAVANNAH
> SPARROWS (not to
> mention Song, Golden-crowned, White-crowned Sparrows &
> juncos) on the
> beef ranch. At one point three Vesper Sparrows flew up into
> the sky to
> tangle with each other about 40 feet above the ground. Most
> of the
> Vesper Sparrows were above (west of) the buildings but one
> was along the
> road near the lower gate. The area around the ranch
> buildings had a pure
> flock of about 10 Chipping Sparrows.
> 
> Along the way through Dunn Forest, I also heard & got
> good looks at a
> singing CASSIN'S VIREO, two HAMMOND'S FLYCATCHER, one
> PACIFIC-SLOPE
> FLYCATCHER (heard a couple more), and oodles of
> BLACK-THROATED GRAY and
> ORANGE-CROWNED WARBLERS. I searched for but couldn't find
> any
> MacGillivray's, Hermit, or Townsend's Warblers (might have
> heard a few
> of the last, but every one that I checked out turned out to
> be a
> Black-throated Gray singing a song variant).
> 
> I had high hopes of a Western Kingbird along this route,
> but the one
> that Michael Dossett reported west of Coffin Butte must
> have moved on,
> and I also didn't see any at Soap Creek Ranch. WILD TURKEYS
> were a bit
> of a hazard in the roadway. 
> 
> I heard a RING-NECKED PHEASANT crowing at the Cold Creek
> Hunting Club
> property -- guess it's a good bet that this is also a
> planted bird, like
> the ones in E.E. Wilson. Some shorebirds were there but too
> far off to
> ID with binoculars -- looked like some Greater Yellowlegs
> but perhaps
> also some others.
> 
> The upper remediation pond at Coffin Butte landfill still
> has six LESSER
> SCAUP.
> 
> Happy birding,
> Joel
> 
> --
> Joel Geier
> Camp Adair area north of Corvallis
> 
> 
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