[obol] Brewer's Blackbird courtship, Yamhill Co

[pamela johnston]

Today I was walking on Riverside Loop at the east side of McMinnville when I 
heard a Brewer's Blackbird making those peculiar combinations of hiss and 
squeak that they  can produce. A male and female were perched together in a 
bush by the roadside, she holding a blade of grass in her bill while he 
erected his contour feathers as if inflating himself, made one of these 
sounds, and returned to his normal contours. The female apparently found 
this as compelling as Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get it On." There's no disputing 
taste in these matters.

Pamela Johnston