That's some great work! Way to go!
On Sun, Dec 4, 2022, 4:24 PM Anthony Hewetson <fattonybirds@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Greetings All:
Sheri Anderson and I covered the Lubbock Cemetery fairly thoroughly,
on foot, this morning ... and it was pretty impressive.
The first goodie: a Townsend's Solitaire right over the car as we got
out - during the course of our visit we had at least five Townsend's
Solitaires, including two that were counter-calling.
The second highlight: four Red-breasted Nuthatches in a single line of
trees near the offices. We had four Red-breasted Nuthatches in a
single thicket near the Lake Six entrance. We had at least one along
the northern fence line. Not counting some seen in the interior,
which might have belonged to the aforementioned groups, we had at
least 9 Red-breasted Nuthatches - remarkable!
The third highlight: a male Red Crossbill munching some of the larger,
woodier cones in one of the ball-shaped conifers near the intersection
of Gallardia and Begonia. This was a very reclusive crossbill,
sticking to the interior of the tree as long as possible, before
fleeing our encroachment ... not to be relocated during this visit.
We had at least eight, probably closer to twelve, Golden-crowned
Kinglets scattered about, two of which were involved in loud conflicts
with Ruby-crowned Kinglets.
Then, along the north fence line, a Chipping Sparrow hanging out with
a small group of White-crowned Sparrows.
Shortly after spotting the first of two Brown Thrashers, we found a
White-breasted Nuthatch in the well-wooded corner west of the office
and almost immediately after that we had an adult Red-shouldered Hawk
flying along the alley west of the cemetery and then towards the
railroad tracks to the southeast, scattering songbirds of all sorts in
its wake.
Finally, more or less in the center of the cemetery, we found the
grandmother of all finch flocks on the ground - at least 142 House
Finches( counting, by twos, only the birds on the ground during a
single sweep) with a female Cassin's Finch; quite possibly the one
originally located by the Cochrans a while back.
Let's hope that all of these birds make it to the upcoming CBC!
Regards; Anthony Hewetson