Date: 10/4/26 12:20 pm From: Kimball Garrett via groups.io <cyanolyca818...> Subject: [LACoBirds] Dickcissel, Black-and-white Warbler at Sorensen Park, Lake L. A.
Birders,
This morning there was a Dickcissel at Sorensen Park (entrance off Ave P, a bit west of 170th Street East in Lake Los Angeles). It was foraging on the lawns just inside the park entrance, accompanied by Chipping and Lake Sparrows. This is outside the fenced (off-limits) renovation area in the eastern part of the park, but that fenced area has some unmowed grass and annual weeds and is likely as attractive to sparrows (and Dickcissels) as the lawn where I saw the bird. That area can be viewed (scope would be handy) from the west or north sides of the fence.
There was a male Black-and-white Warbler in the pines just north of the renovation area fence -- this is just a bit east of the restroom building. Lots of chickadees and Red-breasted Nuthatches in the park and in the salt cedars and willows outside the park (mainly along the drainage north of the park). Of note was a scrub-jay (rare this far out into the Antelope Valley), though sadly it proved to be a California Scrub-Jay.
In other Antelope Valley area news, there was a tight flock of ten Cassin's Finches that briefly landed in our Juniper Hills yard early this morning -- this is another of the irruptive species being seen widely beyond "normal" areas of occurrence this fall.
