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Re: Early House Finch Fledgling
>Today, 03/26/01, I had a House Finch fledgling being feed seed by the adults
>on my deck. I can't imagine when they built the nest. Wow!
>
>Dennis Lankford
>Charlotte, NC
******
DENNIS . . .
This is a remarkable observation. Is it possible that adult males
were courtship-feeding an adult female rather than a fledgling?
Females often solicit males with wing-fluttering and other
juvenile-like behaviors.
My earliest banding of a fledgling House Finch here at Hilton Pond
Center for Piedmont Natural History near York SC was on 7 May 1992,
but the typical early date is the third week of May. Your date of 26
March would be almost two months ahead of that average.
Assuming a two-week incubation period and 14-18 days in the nestling
stage, a female House Finch would need to be sitting on eggs the last
week in February to have a flegling by 26 March. If this is
happening, I guess we'll have to chalk it up as another example of
the effects of global warming!
Happy Birding,
BILL
--
BILL HILTON JR., "The Piedmont Naturalist"
Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History
1432 DeVinney Road, York, South Carolina 29745 USA
hilton@hiltonpond.org, (803) 684-5852, eFax: (503) 218-0845
Please visit our web sites at http://www.hiltonpond.org and
http://www.rubythroat.org
"Never trust a person too lazy to get up for sunrise or too busy to
watch the sunset." BHjr.