Birds of Eastern Washington

In the Spokane Area, work is being done on our small song birds, often called passerines. These birds include many of our most colorful birds - the neotropical migrants. These are the birds which grace us with their presence during the summer breeding season but move away to spend the winter further south in the tropic zone of America - Mexico and South America. These birds are of concern because recent trends show that many of their populations are apparently decreasing. Information is particularly lacking in the Western U.S. To help fill in the gaps in our knowledge of these birds a national program called MAPS - Monitoring Avian Productivity and Survivorship, was begun. Two of these MAPS sites were established in the north Spokane area in 1996. This project uses mist nets, small nylon nets, which the birds fly into and cannot escape. The birds are quickly removed from the nets, age and sex are recorded and a silver band is placed on their leg. Then they are released. This information allows us to know how long the birds survive, how many young are produced and how birds return to an area year after year. The following table summarizes our data for the first two years:

Our Thanks goes to Ken J. Hall and Peter B. Ward for allowing us to use their bird recordings from their series "Nature Sounds of the Northwest." For more information on ordering their cassettes or CD's, email Ken Hall at: kjhall@civil.ubc.ca.

Western Tanager
(326kb) Listen to its song!
A beautiful bird most often seen in our evergreen forests usually high up in the tree tops. Yet, if you are patient you will see the brilliant flash of yellow and orange and may be lucky enough to here its beautiful song.

Picture provided by the National Audubon Society of Washington

House Finch
(245kb) Common bird around cities.
The house finch is common to our urban and suburban areas. It will even winter in our area, sometimes occurring in flocks of  fifty or more birds, often covering our backyard feeding areas or our snowberry bushes.

McGillivray's Warbler
(323kb) A beautiful song from the bushes!
One of our more common neotropical warblers often found in thick brushy areas. You often hear this loud bird before you see it!

Bird Links

• Tweeters (Washington's bird listserver's homepage)

• Virtual Birder

• Birdnet

• Association of Field Ornithologists

• Raptor Research Foundation

• Cooper Ornithological Society

• Hummingbird Page(Beautiful Page)

• On-line Birding

• Partners In Flight(PIF)

• Washington Ornithological Society

• National Audubon Society of Washington

• Spotting Scope & Binocular FAQS

Bird Listservers

• American Ornithological Union's Discussion Group - Send email to:
  listserv@umdd.umd.edu with NO subject and with the message:
  SUBSCRIBE AOUNET-L  John Doe     (where you replace John Doe with your name)

• Ornithological Discussion Group - Send email to:
  listserv@uafsgsb.uark.edu  with NO subject and with the message:
  SUBSCRIBE ORNITH-L  John Doe     (where you replace John Doe with your name)

• Tweeters - Send the following email to:
  listproc@u.washington.edu with NO subject and with the message:
  sub tweeters John Doe     (where you replace John Doe with your name)