[EBB Sightings] Three sing-alikes

Dear Friends:

When I woke up early this morning and heard Western Tanagers and Black-headed Grosbeaks singing I might have imagined I was in my beloved Yosemite, except that I was smelling flowering Meyer lemons instead of sun-warmed yellow pine.

Mid-May, when the Western Tanagers are passing through the Berkeley Hills, pausing to feed and sing a little, is the time of the three sing-alikes.  The resident robins have been caroling since February and the summer resident grosbeaks since they arrived in April.

Though the songs of the three species have strong similarities in the phrasing of their songs, the tanager's song is huskier, slow-paced -- laid back.  The robin' song is eternally cheerful, ringing and begins well before sunrise.  The Grosbeak's rich contralto is passionate, various and sometimes the singer is so full of ardor that he takes to the air for the final exclamatory stanzas.   

   

In response to Doug Vaughn's report of nesting gnatcatchers in Tilden, I recall seeing what may have been a nesting pair a few years back in the willows below the road less than a quarter of a mile beyond the Jewel Lake dam.

--Phila Rogers