Once again the black rosy finches have arrived.  Happened with three “scouts” four days ago, and now around a  hundred scarfing up sunflower seed prodigiously.  
Oddly, only three juncos two weeks ago and none since.  They are usuallyvery numerous here at this time of year.  
And yesterday six goldfinches came to the back feeder (we have many goldfinches summer and winter) that were so different I thought it was a different species til I got binocs on them.  They were almost white on the belly and a light cream on the back, which made the black and white of wings very prominent.  From a distance they appeared to be white with black wings.
They stayed together, were only here for an hour or so, and haven’t been seen since. 
Boy, I wish I had a decent camera!  Santa? ?

Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPad

Before I could even get dressed this morning, I noticed a commotion in the
back corner of the yard. Binoculars revealed a fairly large Sharp-shinned
Hawk on top of a still struggling Mourning Dove. Since we haven’t seen a
Sharpie in the yard for a while, I sat down with binos and watched the scene
play out. The Sharpie kept plucking at the back of the head of the dove,
which struggled for a long time. At one point, when I hadn’t seen any signs
of life from the dove in some time, the dove suddenly made a huge effort to
get out from under and they were both flapping their wings as they fought.

Eventually the struggle ended, and the Sharpie continued to pluck feathers.
Then I started seeing some red so I went about my morning routine, with
occasional stops by the window. After a while even the Sharpie was still,
but his crop was huge by this time. I watched until he flew away, and then I
went out for some “clean up on aisle nine.” For some reason I thought there
would be something besides feathers, but other than a few red spots on the
snow, feathers was all that remained. So beak, skull, legs, wings, rib cage,
etc., were all inside the Sharpie when he flew away. Amazing, and quite a
show.

Tom McCabe, Boise

Interestingly, I found the 1st winter Harris’ Sparrow feeding beneath a cottonwood this afternoon, with a group of 7 juncos. I always scatter some black-oil sunflower seeds underneath that particular tree, to keep the Spotted Towhees coming in. The sparrow allowed for satisfying, lengthy binocular observation. So, he’s still around, too.

Brian Carrigan
Blackfoot

Just got home from Island Park & filled my feeders. Before I could even get back into the house, my Blue Jay flew in & immediately started filling his crop with seeds. So, in spite of single digit lows the past week, he’s still here. Nice to know at least 2 are in SE Idaho.

Also, at Osborne Bridge crossing Henry’s Fk, I counted a total of 35 Trumpeter Swans yesterday. This AM, at the house, I had a group of 20 fly over. I’ve seen as many as 150 in a single group in the area where Chuck reported his sightings. So, depending on the winter, can get such numbers in the surrounding fields. Seems that early single digit cold temps with snow, will concentrate them, esp in winter wheat & alfalfa fields.

Brian Carrigan
Blackfoot