CROWS RULE. THE HAWK’S A FOOL?

Posted by: atowhee | November 8, 2021

CROWS RULE. THE HAWK’S A FOOL?

If you fly around our neighborhood you must be tolerated by the crows. Their numbers are in the dozens as I note when they fly to their evening roost in a hilltop Doug-fir stand. Their voices are dominant, unless a large goose flock is temporarily overhead. Their possession of this territory seems unchallenged. They’ve trained me to feed them peanuts in the shell, for caching. Today an adult red-tail got the brunt of crow disgust. Maybe he was a winter visitor who didn’trealize he was an aerial trespasser.

After the red-tail left the tree aerial pursuit contuinued though I saw no actual damaging contact. Click any image for full screen view.

Less dramatic but more exciting to me, I saw my first White-throated Sparrow of the season and first ever in this garden:

In the final shot you get a decent comparison with a Song Sparrow, who’s resident in this area.

The white-throat is abundant in the eastern US. Western Oregon regularly gets a small number of wintering individuals coming down from the Far North. They are in the same genus as the White-crown and Golden-crown, our own common western birds. I would rate the White-throat as a regular winter migrant, but scarce.

954 Ratcliff Drive SE, Marion, Oregon, US
Nov 8, 2021
13 species

Red-tailed Hawk 1
Northern Flicker 1
Steller’s Jay X
California Scrub-Jay X
American Crow X
Bewick’s Wren 1
Pine Siskin X
Lesser Goldfinch X
American Goldfinch X
Dark-eyed Junco X
Golden-crowned Sparrow X
White-throated Sparrow 1
Song Sparrow X

Posted in birding, birds, Marion County, migratory birds, natural history, oregon, sparrows, Willamette Valley | Tags: Crow, mobbing, Red-tailed Hawk, Song Sparrow, White-throated Sparrow

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