Greetings Everyone, Grigory's audio recording definitely shows type 1 evening grosbeak flight calls. They look very similar to the ones Norm Vargas reported at Mt. Wilson Observatory yesterday. The area in question is east of the locked gate at about mile 54 on the Angeles Crest Highway, and it has actually seen quite a bit of coverage by birders this year. Clark's nutcrackers have been present in modest numbers all summer and have seemed more reliable there than usual. The elevation at the gate is around 6200-6300 feet and is usually about as low in elevation as nutcrackers regularly occur in the area. Most of us visiting the area have walked a mile or two past the locked gate and used the mile 55.44 eBird hotspot for our bird lists. Given that places like Cloud Burst Summit, Buckhorn, Eagle's Roost, and Islip Saddle aren't accessible to cars due to the road closure, you can still park at the gate at mile 54 and walk east along the road or along the Pacific Crest Trail. Right now this provides the easiest access to high elevations on the west side of the Crest. If you visit during weekdays there might be construction crews on the road but on weekends there's much less activity and you might encounter only a few hikers. If you're feeling especially intrepid, it's still possible to walk along the highway to Cloud Burst Summit (about 3 miles, with ~700 feet of elevation gain) or to the Buckhorn area (~4 miles to the entrance, 5 miles to the exit). Note that the entrance road into Buckhorn has multiple deep and wide washouts, so I recommend going in along the exit road, which is in good condition. Regards, Lance Lance BennerPasadena --------------------
From: "Grigory Heaton via groups.io" <g.heaton...> Reply-To: <g.heaton...> To: <LACoBirds...> Sent: September 23, 2026 at 1:46 PM PDT Subject: [LACoBirds] Evening Grosbeak flyover + Irruptions Hi all, I spent some time this morning checking out various points along the 2 in the San Gabriels looking for pinyon jays and other irruption species. After walking a few miles around Chilao campground (no notable sightings, although Lawrence's goldfinches are always a welcome surprise) I decided to check out an area up the road I don't think has been covered recently and walked out behind the road closure at the 6000' gate a bit. Walking the highway right above Glenwood camp, I heard an Evening Grosbeak flying over heading south - spectrogram looks like the expected Type 1 to me but I'm no expert on these: https://ebird.org/checklist/S395599787. I also had two Clark's nutcrackers flying south here, although at this elevation it's not too out of range for nutcrackers. This stretch of closed road is right above a large canyon and may be good for funneling birds heading south over the ridge.
Stopping by Chilao visitor center on the way back, I briefly heard a single pinyon jay.
