Crows, mobbing and caterpillars

Crows at dawn

Arriving before dawn broke I witnessed the return of some of the Crows seen going to roost the other evening. There must of been over 500 this morning, rather more dispersed than the flocks going to roost. I'm determined to master the ID of crows by sight and with the help; of Sibley I think I am getting there. Pretty sure that one flock of 105 were all Fish Crow, some were calling but all seemed to have relatively more pointed wings, small heads and marginally longer tails. It's not easy to read these feautres on all birds though.
Only birds in this group of fish group showed primary moult (some extensive) is there a timing difference between the spp?

*update - Pyles says both species moult July-September *


One suspect American was later seen with minor secondary moult however.












On the lake I initially only found the Merganser but later found the Grebe, on the opposite side.

Lots of House and Goldfinchs around today, a group of the latter feeding on the riverside weeds were watched from the riverbed.
When returning up the hill from the river, a mobbing group of birds were found. I never did find their target, maybe a screech-owl, The party consisted of several Cardinals, Chickadees, Downy Woodpecker and a Catbird (a species not seen for several days), and a Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Blue Jays were on the periphery. It was an impressive and pretty aggressive display.

On the grass area near the picnic shelter a big furry caterpillar was found. First thoughts were a 'Woolly Bear' but there were only thin rings of color. I believe this is actually a Giant Leopard Moth or Eyed Tiger Moth (Hypercompe scribonia)

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Between the dog park and the Magic Spot a bunch of activity including 4-5 Juncos and 10 or so Yellow-rumped Warblers.

The bees were asleep as expected!