Observers: Andy Zdon
Email: mtnbooks@yahoo.com
Remote Name: 209.221.223.91
Date: 04/06/04
Time: 07:05 PM
Okay, first the finch identified as a Purple had all the marks to be a male Purple! However, this morning, a female Cassin's was hanging around with the male Purple. Doubt set in. Debbie Parker and the Tuesday am birding group came over to the house and also saw the female Cassin's but the male Purple (?) was nowhere to be seen. I had to run into town and upon returning...3 male Cassin's and 2 female Cassin's in the yard. The bill on what I called a Purple did not appear to be as straight or pyramidal as the Cassin's present so could it be a Purple traveling with a small group of Cassin's? If anybody has ever observed this i'd like to know...otherwise i'm just calling the Cassin's and leaving the Purple with a question-mark! Of note is that the Cassin's / Purple are reallly skittish, and generally only come down to the feeder area to feed when the mass of House Finches that are usually around make themselves scarce. After finching, we went up to the White Mountain Estates common area (a spring fed riparian area) where we spotted Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, Bewick's Wren, Sage Sparrow, Say's Phoebe, and juvenile Red-tailed Hawk, a few California Quail, and likely some birds i'm forgetting right now!! A great day!