Evening Grosbeaks, female on left, male on rightIf you haven't guessed by now, our theme of the week is "irrputive species," those usually more northern species of birds who "irrupt" in large scale movements and come down into the U.S. during winters when their seed and cone food supply is lacking. We have heard that this has been a poor year for the cone crop in Canada and there is anecdotal evidence that the Pinyon nut crop in California, Utah and Nevada completely failed this year.
We had Evening Grosbeaks flying overhead here yesterday in southern NH. Watch for these big "space cadet" looking finches with the very large beaks to potentially show up at feeders across much of the U.S. Sunflower is their favorite seed. They like large perches to accomodate their size, so tray feeders and feeders with wide ledges are ideal.
In the West, even Pinyon Jays, who rely on that Pinyon nut cone crop, may be forced out of their usual range. It's shaping up to be a very unusual year.
Photo © Lillian Stokes, 2007
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