Re: Hummingbird Info

Diann, I’m intrigued about the Bethine Church trail, does it run adjacent to the Park Center bridge?  I grew up near there and a few times last spring before things went crazy, I birded it with some friends.  We walked from Eckart to Park Center, and we entered several named areas – Marianne Williams, etc., birded near the bridge in a beautiful wild riparian area, had lunch, then headed to Shakespeare Festival grounds.  It is much changed since my brothers and I waded/floated that part of the river.

Liz Medes
Emmett

Re: Hummingbird Info

That’s a good variety of species. It’s always fun to watch young ones. 

Along the Bethine Church Trail in Boise Saturday morning (8/1/2020) I observed Great Blue Heron, Belted Kingfisher, Black-capped Chickadee, plus young ones and adults of Cassin’s Finch, Cedar Waxwing, and Mute Swan. It’s a busy part of the birding season.
Diann Stone 
Boise Depot Bench 

Re: Lesser Goldfinch

We do see them NE of here. I can’t find my full correct notes but several years ago (possibly before 2014) while on a Golden Eagle F/T we found them nesting openly in an evergreen up along More’s Ck. across Hwy 21 from where Dunnigan Ck. comes in.
I believe Michael Wiegand had some of the earliest if not first sightings in the Boise area. They were coming into his home’s backyard feeders when he lived up in the Highlands. He invited myself and a couple others to come there and see them, that would be in Feb. 99 according to my first sightings log. We took him up on that saw them up close and personal. Lifer for me. Michael could likely give more details.
I don’t quite remember if it was me found them on E. Teresa or someone called them in to me as shortly afterward they were also found nearby up on Pet Haven (now closed to public access).
CGB. RL

Re: Lesser Goldfinch

We have swarms of Lesser Goldfinches and our thistle and “no mess blend” from wild birds unlimited …  feeders at our apartment near Parkcenter and Mallard in S.E. Boise currently and year round we have them at varying levels.  We also have Pine Siskin that just returned, Red-breasted Nuthatches and Black-capped Chickadees along with the House Finches, House Sparrows and Song Sparrows, Mourning Doves and California Quail on the ground below.

We have lived in S.E. Boise for 35 years, I was not a birder back then at all and my wife was very casual. We built a house on S. Oak Brook Way of Boise Avenue in 1986 and lived there for about 10 years and my wife remembers lot’s of Gold Finches but not which ones. We then moved to Surprise Valley (it is east of Barber Park and just accross the river from Terersa Drive and she got more into birding and started feeding birds she was seeing Lesser Goldfinches and Lazuli Buntings and much more and bought bird books and binoculars and away she went.  We were in Surprise Valley for about 10 years then sold the big house and moved to a condo in Heron Cove (part of River Run) off Parkcenter. Lesser Goldfinches became a staple there and I retired and took up photography and my wife infected me with the birding virus 🙂 When we sold the condo and moved to Brookdale on Loggers Creek and now to Huntington also bordered by Loggers Creek the Lesser Goldfinches just kept following us 🙂
So until I read this string I did not know that Lesser Goldfinches were not the norm in the Treasure Valley. Still a new birder learning something new every day.
On Aug 2, 2020, at 3:14 PM, rbird1286 via groups.io <ruthanngreene@…> wrote:


Thanks so much for the input.  Surprisingly…or not, I am 1.5 miles from Eagle Road off McMillan.   My other house was South of the Freeway.

On Sunday, August 2, 2020, 3:09:11 PM MDT, bike4birds <tmccabe9@…> wrote:

When I first joined IBLE (lo, these many years ago), I went birding with RL and he directed me to a small neighborhood out Warm Springs, near where Idaho 21 now crosses the Boise River. We went there to see the Lesser Goldfinches that–apparently– could be found nowhere else in the Treasure Valley.

Within a few years, I started seeing Lesser Goldfinches at my feeders in the North End. Now, I see and hear them all along the Boise River, at least to Eagle Road. (Going to Eagle Road is a LONG bike ride for me, and I have rarely ventured beyond it.)

Long story short—I think they have been expanding their range in the valley for some time. If I were you I would greet them warmly, maybe put out an extra sock feeder (they love nyger thistle), and sit back and enjoy. Their year round yellow is a delight on a dreary winter day.

Tom McCabe, Boise  

 

From: IBLE@groups.io [mailto:IBLE@groups.io] On Behalf Of rbird1286 via groups.io
Sent: Sunday, August 02, 2020 2:12 PM
To: IBLE@groups.io
Subject: [IBLE] Lesser Goldfinch

 

This morning I saw a lesser goldfinch in my neighbors front yard in North Meridian.  Never having seen one in 25 years of living in Idaho I was wondering if his was unusual or not?

We have a couple of yards that have sunflowers in them, but I grew sunflowers at my other home in Meridian and never saw them…would just get American Goldfinches.

Ruthann Greene


Ken Miracle
chukar28@…
208-570-2780
“Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God” 2COR 3:5