<html><head></head><body><div class="yahoo-style-wrap" style="font-family:bookman old style, new york, times, serif;font-size:16px;"><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Dear Tweeters,</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Since Anna Kopitov inquired about interesting yard birds, I will chime in. About ten days ago, a large number of White-crowned Sparrows showed up at my place, near Lyman in the Skagit Valley. This was a larger than usual incursion. Yesterday I was able to count 48 White-crowned Sparrows in the yard, and this morning, 51! There have been only a handful of times when I've seen over ten here at one time, and the most I remember seeing was about 30, which was also in late April, just a few years ago. These birds are not the local breeding subspecies, which would be <i>pugetensis.</i></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">The routine naming of birds by their subspecies normally elicits at least a silent harrumph from me, if not an audible one. That goes for White-crowned Sparrows and a lot of other species as well. I think that there are now a lot of birders who have noticed lists of subspecific epithets on eBird; then they automatically assign those names to the birds that they see in their particular area. Harrumph.</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Roger Tory Peterson addressed this matter in his classic <i>Field Guide to the Birds. </i>In an appendix to this work, he quotes Dr. George Miksch Sutton at length. Sutton's remarks conclude with the following gem: "The use of the trinomial very often is a sort of four-flushing." I don't play poker, but I know what that means.</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Nonetheless, I can tell that the great majority of the White-crowned Sparrows visiting my place right are not the local breeders. I reckon they must be <i>gambelii. </i>The local breeding birds had been here for several weeks before the migrants arrived. I had been hearing the local breeders singing their song, which always sounds like, "Hey, yooooou, gimme back my cheese!" Those birds must be <i>pugetensis. </i>Over the last ten days or so, the songs of the migrant White-crowned Sparrows have been drowning out those of the locals. I can never figure out how to characterize the song of the migrant White-crowns, but it is nothing like that of our local breeders. The migrants are almost certainly <i>gambelii. </i></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Yesterday the throng of sparrows and other birds at my feeders disappeared for a while. That was because an <i>Accipiter</i> flew in and perched on the bird-bath! This was a spiffy adult Cooper's Hawk, sporting an aluminum band on its right leg. Alas, I could not read the band through the windowpane. There were no color bands that I could see.</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">This morning a female Black-headed Grosbeak visited the feeder. This is a few days early.</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Yours truly,</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false">Gary Bletsch</div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div><div dir="ltr" data-setdir="false"><br></div></div></body></html>