We just spent four days in San Diego. Surfers think they are tops. Porsche drivers always think they own the roads. Developers have seized the day, the week, the years and covered all but vertical slopes with more and more stucco. Gas costs $5/gallon so you might think the Hunt Brothers’ Chevron owns the world. But I took my binoculars and I aver that Northern Mockingbirds rule in that southern stronghold. They are omnipresent, omnivocal and omnibelligerent.Their spring territorial displays fo far beyond song. They fly up with wings and tails flashing bold white patches, then flutter back to a singing perch again.
Or course, the mocker is a supreme mimic as are his thrasher cousins:
As soon as we got away from parking lots and stores the song of the local mockers could be heard. A melodious warning of ownership laced with emboldened effrontery.
On the attack against an over-flown raven:
Posted by: atowhee | April 23, 2019
TYRANNUS REX IN SAN DIEGO
Posted in birding, birds, birdsong, california, corvids, natural history | Tags: aggression, mimic, Mockingbird, Raven, San Diego
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