Wednesday, November 18, 2020 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
Tales from a
Sisters
Naturalist
by Jim Anderson
A bevy of
bushtits
Note: This story is dedi-
cated to Alex Trebek, the long-
time host of Jeopardy! who
has gone out among the stars.
Another plus has popped
up for Sue and me on leav-
ing Sisters and coming over
here to The Swamp to live
near our son Caleb and his
family in Eugene: a bevy of
bushtits, and other wildlife
coming to our feeders and
water feature. They9re com-
ing nearly daily in a mob to
our suet feeder.
Mobbing everything is
what bushtits do, and they
do it with 100 percent coop-
eration and gusto, even when
nesting.
I9ve only seen one bush-
tit nest, and that was when
I was working for OMSI
back in the 1960s, living on
my little <U-Pick= farm out-
side of Beaverton. At first,
I thought a silly wind had
flipped an old sock into the
lower branches of a fir tree in
my backyard. But as I stood
there looking at it, suddenly
a tiny bird went zipping past
my head and dove directly
into the top of the sock.
<What the&?= I thought,
and moved a little closer. As
I stood there, still as a cat
watching a mouse, another
tiny bird came out of the
shrubs like a grey blur and
also popped into the top of
the sock.
That was when it hit me:
It wasn9t a <sock= at all, but a
bird nest. Then I went a little
closer and could see it was
made of plant material, not
sewn together tightly, but just
small chunks of what looked
like some kind of leafy mesh,
sort of hooked together.
At about that moment
three tiny birds came zipping
out and what I noticed (I was
standing that close) was their
tiny beaks and the color of
their eyes: two had yellow
and one had black eyes.
It wasn9t until I got to
breaking open the books on
birds that I discovered who
they were and what the heck
was going on in that sock-
like nest. I learned that the
females were the yellow-
eyed ones. Thank goodness
the book didn9t say they9d
peck my eyes out if I got too
close to their nest.
The 20 or so individu-
als pigging out on my suet
feeder just outside my pic-
ture window here in Eugene
confirmed they enjoy being
together in just about every-
thing they do.
Oh, and this being our
election year, I have to tell
you the proper name for
these tiny birds in the U.S. is
<American Bushtit,= scien-
tific name, Psaltriparus min-
imus. I9m not a Latin scholar,
so I have no idea what the
genus name means, but the
species name means <small.=
One of the bird books
described them as, <drab
birds with light ticking and
lisping call notes.= I don9t
consider them drab, not for
a minute. When they hit
my suet feeder there9s noth-
ing drab about their looks,
sounds or behavior.
They9re supposed to be
<common in woods and
mountains of the west,= but
you gotta be on the ball,
looking and listening to find
The Law Offi ce of
JOHN H. MYERS, LLC
them <common,= because
they are so tiny. But, the real
good news is they are not
endangered.
A flock feeding in a tree
may go almost unnoticed
until they fly out, or you
suddenly hear them. Then
there9s usually twenty or
thirty of them flitting by to
the next tree.
Thinking over where you
find them, it9s not so strange
that they do everything in a
group. They are very socia-
ble while finding, and feed-
ing on, insects and spiders.
And those groups will stay
warm and cuddly roosting
close together in a tight mass
on cold nights.
Hang a suet feeder up that
the downy and hairy wood-
peckers 4 along with that
beautiful Sisters icon the
white-headed woodpeckers
PHOTO BY KENDRA ANDERSON
A bevy of bushtits; just half of the 20 that were there just before my
daughter-in-law got up to the window to shoot their picture.
4 will come to, and bushtits
will think they9ve died and
gone to heaven 4 which is
Oregon
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W
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where I hope Alex Trebek
is hosting these days, and I
hope I get to see him.
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