January 12 to March 8, 1998
by Angie and Colin Dillingham

Spring is here - a little bird told me so. Actually, it was a big bird. On February 21st. we spied our first turkey vulture in the lower Rogue valley - an unlikely, but sure-fire harbinger of winter’s end. Shortly thereafter came the little bird. Our first encounter with a Selasphorus hummingbird was on February 28th. These are the smaller cousins of the Anna’s hummers. Anna’s stay with us all winter but the Rufous and Allen’s (both genus Selasphorus) are gone from Curry in autumn and winter. Our Selasphorus (we couldn’t see the color of the back to determine which species that male was) was feeding on red-flowering current and hairy manzanita blossoms up the Quosatana Creek road. These little guys are putting on quite a display these days. To attract a mate the Allen’s males will swoop down from great heights in a J-shaped pattern, while the Rufous males will zoom around in loops. The Anna’s are already on the nest. Along with the great-horned owl, who we heard hooting in January, the Anna’s are the earliest to reproduce in Curry County. Other early spring records are a green heron by Mike Miller on March 1 up Hunter Creek, a morning dove Colin saw on March 7, and an orange-crowned warbler on March 8th, both at Jerry’s Flat. Perhaps some of you noticed the arrival of spring birds even earlier than we did.

Speaking of hummingbirds feeding on flowering plants up the Quosatana road, be sure to come to the dedication of the Quosatana Hummingbird Garden. Many hours of work have been volunteered preparing the site for the delight of both hummers and humans.

Looking back on winter’s birds a few sightings stand out. Most noteably was the black-vented shearwater that Jim Rogers saw off Cape Blanco on February 8. Not only was this the first record for this species in Curry County, but it has the much-envied and hard-won distinction of being the 300th bird species Jim has seen in Curry. Congratulations Jim! Other winter oddities were the Heermann’s gulls that chose to linger all winter, in groups of up to 50 (seen by Alan Barron at the mouth of the Chetco), and the solitary brown pelicans which Jim Rogers and Colin each saw this winter. Although the brown pelicans are occasionally sighted in winter in Curry, the large numbers of Heermann’s gull are unprecedented. Heermann’s should be breeding on rocky islands off the Gulf of California now. Another El Niño phenomenon?