WESTERN TANAGER OR-311
Eastern Oregon: Prairie City, Malheur National Forest, Picture Gorge
June 13, 4:20 a.m.
Sunrise at 5:09 a.m.
A western tanager in dawn song. He begins with four slowly delivered song phrases, then his signature call, the pit-er-ick, here sounding perhaps more like a shortened, two-syllable per-dick.
Measuring a few of his song phrases, I calculate that he sings about 1.4 song phrases per second. That's a typical slow dawn pace for these tanagers.
Background
Other western tanagers in the distance.
Photo by John Van de Graaff
