Bird-watchers flock to Olympia after sighting of redwing

OLYMPIA – Bird enthusiasts in the state capital city are aflutter over a Eurasian thrush, apparently the first of its kind to be seen on the continent.

Eugene Revelas, 45, a birder from age 12, posted a report Monday night on a regional bird-watching Web site after he recognized a bird he saw with some robins in his back yard as a redwing, or Turdus iliacus, which he had spotted on a trip to Ireland in April.

Bill Tweit, a leading south Puget Sound birder and member of the Black Hills Audubon Society, confirmed the sighting Tuesday morning, again in a flock of robins, at a nearby intersection in the city’s west end.

By that afternoon 20 bird-watchers had gathered for a look at the bird, which is slightly smaller than a robin, sleeker than a varied thrush and marked by a creamy-white eye stripe and rusty red flanks and underwings.

It’s the only documented sighting in North America of a redwing, which “could be mistaken for a funny-looking baby robin,” Tweit said.

Nomadic and gregarious, the redwing issues a “seep” call with a weak song of three or four fluty notes, feeds on worms and berries and has a maximum life expectancy of about 18 years, breeding across northern Europe to Siberia and usually wintering in southern Europe, north Africa and the Middle East.

“This bird would have had to fly south and east across the Pacific Ocean, instead of south and west,” Tweit said.

If the redwing stays the rest of the winter in Olympia, it could draw birders from across the country who want to expand their lifetime list of bird sightings, he added.