[obol] cardinals as caged birds & misc.

[Mike Patterson]

My one and only experience with cardinals in Oregon was a pair which 
we know were caged birds, deliberately released in Cottage Grove.  
I never saw them personally, but we kept hearing about them into the 
mid-1970's.  The perps were NOT hispanic (they were Norwegian if
memory serves).

My grandmother kept a Black-headed Grosbeak named "Mr. Bill" that the
cat brought in in a cage for several years in the 1940's.  She was
Scotch-Irish.

The neighbor boy used to catch Evening Grosbeaks in noose traps at
his mother's bird feeder and keep them for short periods of time until
I explained the MBTA (see previous post) to his mother.  They had a
Finnish last name.

People keep stuff in cages even when it's against the law to do so.
I have every confidence that if I were to start knocking on doors in
Astoria, I'd find a few illegally kept birds (this place is crawling
with Norwegians and Finns).

I freely admit that I have opinions, tons of 'em and my opinion is that 
data suggesting that cardinals rarely move more than a couple miles from 
where they were banded trumps the not supported by any data "maybe it 
got here on its own" speculations.

It is my opinion that this record should be submitted to the records 
committee.

And it is also my opinion that when they put it in the "origin questionable"
pile where, in my opinion, it belongs, anybody who disagrees with the
verdict can include it on their personal life list.

Because, in my opinion, a person's life-list ain't nobody's business
but his or her own.

We would do well to sort the life-list part of this question from the
records keeping for posterity part. 

-- 
Mike Patterson               
Astoria, OR                    
celata at pacifier.com  
 
When bad photos happen to good birds
http://www.surfbirds.com/blogs/mbalame/archives/2008/03/photo20080313.html