King of the Quail Block

I’ve always been a big cowbird fan, and living in southeast Arizona gives me two species to admire. Bronzed Cowbirds drop in to our yard occasionally in the spring, and one male this morning is dominating everything else (even the desert cottontails!) at the quail block out my window; even the House Sparrows and Pyrrhuloxias wait for the red-eyed beauty to finish.

Another male is singing from the other side of the house, his weird squeaks and squeals traveling through the living room window, down the hallway, and into my workroom. Yesterday I got up twice, thinking I’d heard the alarm bleep, to see who was opening the kitchen door! But both times it was the cowbird, that incredible circular ruff spread so wide that it lifted him off the ground as he sang.

Oh, a nice MacGillivray’s Warbler has just joined the scroungers under the hackberry thicket.