yellow legs and red seeds

A flock of a dozen-and-a-half Lesser Yellowlegs was over the creek yesterday morning. They were calling to each other with a rather soft flute-y call and, as far as I could see, had rather short bills -- for which reasons I am calling them Lessers! Lessers are tundra nesters and their breeding range is further north than the Greater so they tend to turn up later in the season when the weather starts to turn cold.

White-throated Sparrows have been surprisingly sparse but they now seem to be filtering in; when the weather is warmish (as it was the past two mornings), they identify themselves by singing. Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers, another northern nester that has been missing for the past few days, turned up again yesterday and this morning. A fairly large flock of American Robins accompanied by a few other birds was feeding on the ripening red seeds in the cone-shaped pod of a Big-leaf Magnolia. There were a lot of noisy birds in the neighborhood but they all appeared to be common local breeders or visitors -- whether annoyed at the influx of Robins or trying to join in, I couldn't say.

Eric Salzman