I saw this on VA-Birds. I don't recall hearing about White-winged Crossbills in DC since the influx in the Reno Rd. area a month or so ago.
 
Tyler Bell

California, Maryland 

Subject: White-winged Crossbills in DC
From: "Steve Hersey" <shersey AT booksforamerica.org>
Date: Mon, 06 Apr 2009 13:15:22 +0000

Had a very unexpected and very welcome swarm of White-winged Crossbills invade 
my neighborhood in DC this morning. We live across from the Zoo and were 
walking to our car at 8:15am when approx. 20 Crossbills took over a couple 
conifers in front of 2801 Cortland Place, NW (the neighborhood behind 3100 
Connecticut Ave.). 


It is a dark, gloomy morning so the light was horrible, but the birds were 
unmistakable. Black wings with two nice large wingbars, and frantically tearing 
into the cones. We didn't have our binoculars with us so we couldn't enjoy 
seeing their famous bills. And couldn't find any colored males in the two 
minutes we had to view them. And then, as crossbills do, they were gone. I 
circled the neighborhood a couple times with no luck. I'm going to check again 
this evening and again tomorrow morning - hopefully they will reappear! 


Cheers,
Steve Hersey
Washington, DC