[SBB] W Tanagers nesting in Los Altos?

["Garth Harwood" <[[email protected]]>]

>
Mime-version: 1.0
X-Priority: 3
Content-type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit

Hello All,

Yesterday, June 7 2005, I followed up on the singing Western Tanager I
encountered at Los Altos' Shoup Park on 5/23.  There wasn't any tanager
activity at Shoup, but I decided to check the tiny "nature preserve" called
Redwood Grove just upstream, and also maintained by the government of Los
Altos. There I encountered a M/F pair of WETA defending a probable nest site
against avian intruders. I checked there again today 6/8 at the same time
and had the male at the same place acting very territorial around the
redwoods just across the bridge and to the left at the entrance to the park
itself (as opposed to the entry from University Ave. that one must walk down
to access the preserve.) If I had to guess I would say that the female is
now on the nest and the male is serving as sentinel while she incubates. He
shows no sign, yet, of foraging for young or carrying food, but that should
commence soon and make locating of the nest fairly easy with a bit of
patience. (Provided the many corvids present don't raid the nest first, of
course.)

Also present during my 6/7 visit from 2:30-3:30 PM were Brown Creeper,
Pac-slope Flycatcher, and flyover American Goldfinch and White-throated
Swift. Not bad for the 'burbs!

The park is sadly lacking as a nature preserve - the majority of plant
species being non-native, for starters, including the redwoods down here on
the flats - but apparently it doesn't take all that much to attract a few
special native birds.

Later in the afternoon 6/7, while checking nestboxes at Arastradero, I had 2
Vaux's Swifts and 2 White-throated Swifts among various swallow species
foraging over the north part of the park (uphill from the parking area) at
5-6PM.

--Garth Harwood
_______________________________________________
Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored.
south-bay-birds mailing list      ([[email protected]])
Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription:
http://www.plaidworks.com/mailman/options/south-bay-birds/list_fred_archives%40plaidworks.org

This email sent to [[email protected]]