[EBB Sightings] more cedarwaxwings

Dear Birders:

It appears that we are all awash in cedar waxwings these days.  Yesterday 
while walking, I looked up because of the swoosh and whirr of many wings to 
see a huge flock fly into my neighbors deodar cedar tree where they artfully 
arranged themselves on the upper branches, discussing the matter in their 
high sibilant voices.  Another flock arrived requiring more rearrangement. 
Then for no reason obvious to me they all took off.  This congregation of 
several hundred birds were certainly not the "four Tao philosophers" that 
Robert Francis writes about in his delightful, well known poem, titled 
simply "Waxwings."

At this late date one wonders when they give up this "groupie" life for the 
more serious and solitary business of procreation.  According to Kenn 
Kaufman in his "Lives of North American Birds" nesting is often late, not 
beginning until midsummer.  And they still prefer the
sociability of a group defending only a small territory, nesting near others 
in small colonies.

Phila Rogers