721713

Strong front passed last night. Light rain this morning during first half of this observation period. Overcast, calm to light winds.--***--Chipping Sparrows: While I was walking through the sagebrush along the eastern end of the creek early this afternoon, a flock of 60 chipping sparrows flew just overhead and around me while I stood counting them. The first part of the flock landed atop surrounding sagebrush and on ground, where I viewed them with 10x40 binoculars, before the rest of the flock began flying over the creek and up to the western sagebrush slope. A half hour later, when I returned to the parking lot, I counted another flock of 40 flying across the lot to the creek where they drank and bathed. It appeared they had just arrived, but I did not count them because they might have been from the previous group. So the total could have been 102, rather than 62.--***--The White-crowned Sparrow was an oriantha subspecies. --***--I believe one of a small group of Black-headed Grosbeaks was a female Rose-breasted Grosbeak because of the breast streaking, but the observation was too short to write a description.

Brewer's Blackbird Euphagus cyanocephalus