iTerm2: stale content bleeds through scrollback, middle sections of conversation disappear

Description

During long Claude Code sessions in iTerm2, two related display issues:

1. Middle sections of conversation disappear from scrollback. Content from the middle of the conversation becomes invisible when scrolling back — not cut off at the top (scrollback limit), but chunks missing from the middle. The AI still has the content in context (can recall it when asked), so this is purely a display issue.

1. Stale Claude Code welcome screen renders below active conversation. The orange crab logo / version info / welcome screen from session startup (or a previous session) appears below the current conversation when scrolling, as if old terminal buffer content is bleeding through.

Environment

• Claude Code v2.1.76
• Opus 4.6 (1M context) · Claude Max
• iTerm2 on macOS (Darwin 25.3.0)
• Scrollback buffer: 50,000 lines
• Context usage at time of issue: ~14-15% (nowhere near compaction threshold)

Reproduction

Happens during long sessions with many tool calls producing large outputs (12KB+ script reads, Discord API responses, SSH command outputs). More likely to occur as the session gets longer and more tool outputs accumulate.

Screenshot

The stale welcome screen bleeding through below the active conversation:

![Screenshot shows Claude Code v2.1.76 welcome screen with orange crab logo appearing below active conversation output, with a previous session's content rendering below the current input area]

Expected Behavior

All conversation content should remain visible in scrollback. No stale content from session startup should render below the active conversation.

Notes

• This is NOT context compaction — context usage was only 14-15% of 1M window
• Scrollback buffer is set to 50,000 lines — well above what's needed
• The missing content is still in the AI's context (confirmed by asking it to recall specific details from the "missing" sections)
• Resizing the window sometimes forces a re-render, but doesn't consistently fix it

🤖 Generated with Claude Code