[EBB Sightings] First backyard Black-headed Grosbeak of the season

We live in the hills of North-east Berkeley and today we saw the first
Black-headed Grosbeak (a male... which always seems to come before the
females) in our yard for this season.  We've lived here for 10 years, and
their first appearance has been getting earlier each year.  Originally we'd
first see them in mid-May (though we weren't actually into birds as much
then... so perhaps we just weren't noticing them).  Last year we saw one on
April 15th, and now this year we saw our first on April 7th.  We usually get
four pairs each year, get to see some babies, and then they leave by
mid-September (though last year we had one straggler into October).  These
are our favorite backyard birds... this time of the year we put up extra
feeders in our backyard (currently five feeders... as the females don't
share too well), and we make sure that there is a lot of medium sunflower
chips in the feeders for them.

Scot Sutherland
Berkeley, CA
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.diabloaudubon.com/mailman2/private/sightings/attachments/20060407/7f79da78/attachment.html