Actually, these thrushes are known to be very defensive at their feeding stations, especially males. They even have a special display (from All About Birds):
a.. Males, but only rarely females, defend and maintain small feeding territories around bird feeders. They are aggressive and dominate many other feeder bird species. a.. To defend a territory a male may first give a Tail-Up display where the bird faces away from the intruder and holds its tail up to show off the gray-and-white patterned undertail coverts. If the intruder keeps coming the male may turn around and give the Head-Forward display with the wings fanned to show off the orange wing stripe and the tail cocked up over the head showing the white corners. I thought that was pretty interesting... Alyssa DeRubeis ----- Original Message ----- From: "linda" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]>; <[email protected]> Sent: Saturday, February 17, 2007 8:35 PM Subject: [mou] spirited v. thrush > The varied thrush was observed again > today at the Eleanor/Edgecumbe site at 11:30 AM, a lifer for Rob. We first > saw him in the maple tree that stands between the little spruce and the > lilac bushes at the edge of the yard. He then flew down to eat under the > feeders for about 10 minutes. > To our surprise, he was very assertive in dealing with house sparrows; a > few different times, he chased sparrows out of his personal eating space, > holding his own though outnumbered. He remained alert while feeding, > raising his head and glancing around regularly. After a short period, he > flew off low to the east, past the garage, toward the yard across the > alley. > > Linda Whyte > > _______________________________________________ > mou-net mailing list > [email protected] > http://cbs.umn.edu/mailman/listinfo/mou-net >
