Archive for April, 2007
Gray, Black, Rose, and Flame
Posted by: | CommentsI get to bird with Betty once a year if I’m lucky, so I was excited to learn that she and her friend Rick would be visiting Tucson. We met up early this morning and headed north for a couple of targets, then south for a couple more. Our route made for long drives, but that was fine with me, giving us a chance to catch up as we covered the miles between birds.
Our first stop was the Dudleyville city park, always worth checking in spring for migrants. Lucy’s Warblers and Bell’s Vireos were firmly in command of the mesquites, and the songs of Yellow-breasted Chats echoed from every corner; one male perched high in a tree and launched himself into that crazy flight display every few minutes.
I never get tired of chats. When I first met Betty 30 years ago, the species still bred within hearing distance of my family’s house in southeast Nebraska. Now, though, Betty confirmed my sad suspicions that it is essentially extirpated from the eastern half of the state.
I kept us in Dudleyville too long, and it was getting warm already by the time we reached the famous pull-off south of Globe. Scott’s Orioles flashed across the hillside while Spotted Towhees and Black-chinned Sparrows sang from the manzanita. Gray Vireos were audible as soon as we stepped out of the car, but we had just the barest of glimpses of flying birds at our first site. So it was down the hill a few hundred yards, where one sang close and in the open for a couple of minutes, giving us the sort of views I always hope for and sometimes, sometimes, get up there.
We kept our eyes peeled as the road went up and then back down the Gila River. Nothing in the sky but Turkey Vultures, though, so we dropped down onto Winkelman Flats. We hadn’t even parked the car when Rick spotted a dark smudge upstream, which resolved itself nicely into a Common Black-Hawk.
All three of us had nice leisurely scope views before another park user got too close and the bird took off upstream, I hope in the direction of a nest.
Lunch and siestas: it’s that time of year! Rick and Betty picked me up again mid-afternoon, and this time we headed south for Madera Canyon. It was fairly quiet most places, though we did pick up a few migrants, one at a time, including a couple of Hermit Warblers. Our vigil at Madera Kubo was longer than I’d anticipated, but when the opening act includes Blue-throated Hummingbird and Rose-breasted Grosbeak, the audience is patient!
Soon enough, though, the star bestrode the stage. The male Flame-colored Tanager called quietly a couple of times from the trees above the road, then came down for his hourly dose of grape jelly. A colorful place right now, Madera!
When we had had our fill, and the tanager his, we moved up to the upper parking lot, where a distant Elegant Trogon was yoinking away. The real surprises, however, were an adult Sharp-shinned Hawk, followed an hour later by a Northern Goshawk that soared over our heads low. The Sharp-shin was either late or one of southeast Arizona’s rare summer residents; it turns out that there have been several sightings of the species, and probably of this individual, in upper Madera in the last couple of days, making me suspect that this may be a breeder. Goshawk is much more expected, but always a great bird to see at close range, and this one turned out to be our last diurnal raptor of the day.
Not our last raptor, though. The Santa Rita Lodge Elf Owls appeared right on schedule, despite some pretty shocking harrassment by a startlingly rude photographer. While we watched the little guys at their telephone pole home, a Whiskered Screech-Owl started to sing from the hillside. It’s starting to sound like May!
Where I’ve Been and What I’ve Seen (IV): Lacassine Bitterns
Posted by: | CommentsThe Lafayette Convention was memorable in many ways, but the experience that has burned itself into my mind was the bittern show at Lacassine National Wildlife Refuge.
Strictly speaking, we were poaching a bit on other trips’ turf when we arrived there for lunch on the first day; but our conscience was quickly salved by the sight of an American Bittern posed motionless in the ditch. And then another flew out of the marsh, and then another…. And by the time we had finished our quick lunch (to the musical accompaniment of Black-bellied and Fulvous Whistling-Ducks and [slightly less musical!]Â Purple Gallinules), we had had no fewer than nine flyovers by this normally secretive and always scarce heron.
The experience was repeated on each visit, often with two or three American Bitterns in the sky at once. But Saturday’s trip took the cake: not only did we have (ho-hum) nearly a dozen flyovers of that species, but beautiful close-up views of two Least Bitterns, in flight and perched in the rushes, giving me my best bittern day ever by far, and one of the richest ciconiiform lists I’d ever accumulated: besides the two brown beauties, we also recorded Great Blue Heron; Great and Snowy Egrets; Little Blue and Tricolored Herons; Cattle Egret; Green Heron; Yellow-crowned Night-Heron; White, Glossy, and White-faced Ibis; and Roseate Spoonbill. If the vultures hadn’t played so hard to get (read: impossible to get), we’d have tallied 15 species, about as long a list as you can get inland in the US.
No bittern photos, unfortunately, but another “Buff-backed Heron” to delight the eye.
Where I’ve Been and What I’ve Seen (III)
Posted by: | CommentsMy visit to Georgia passed way too quickly, and after a few hours enjoying the Barred Owls, Brown-headed Nuthatches, and Eastern Towhees in Alison’s backyard, it was off to the American Birding Association in Lafayette, Louisiana. ABA events are always great for getting together with old friends and making new ones, and I was doubly excited this time because not only would the Pelican State be a “life state” for me, but I would get to bird it with Richard Crossley, helping him out on field trips into the rice fields in search of shorebirds.
We sought and we found. Among the 23 species of shorebirds we were able to show the trip participants were American Golden-Plover, Hudsonian Godwit, Stilt Sandpiper, Upland Sandpiper, Whimbrel, White-rumped Sandpiper, Buff-breasted Sandpiper, and Wilson’s Phalarope. It was a bit like my midwestern childhood, with the notable difference that I was birding with one of the truly big names in shorebirding. Richard is not just a great birder, but an excellent pedagogue as well, and everyone in the van (including me, of course) learned a tremendous amount about these birds.
Busy driving, scoping, and occasionally gabbing, I didn’t take many photos on the field trips proper. Ann Hoff and I did sneak out Wednesday morning, though, and I managed a few shots of the commoner species, including Dunlin and Least and Semipalmated Sandpipers.
Pectoral Sandpiper, always one of my favorites, is pretty scarce in southeast Arizona, and each day we were out I saw more than a year’s quota.
But it wasn’t all about shorebirds. The rice fields were great habitat for herons and rails, including King Rail. Little Blue Herons were ubiquitous, and our last morning out produced fantastic views of close-up Yellow-crowned Night-Herons.
Cattle Egrets were everywhere, including in a pasture with two American bison, a time-warp if ever there was one.
We never saw a major fallout of passerine migrants, in part because of the weather (beautiful the entire week, alas!) and in part because of our chosen habitat. Ann and I did run into a good arrival of Dickcissels and Sedge Wrens one morning.
With beauties like this singing away, who needs warblers?
Where I’ve Been and What I’ve Seen (II)
Posted by: | CommentsThe second day of the GOS/FOS meeting was as good as the first. Chuck Saleeby and Bill Lotz, outstanding birders both, led our group to Altamaha WMA, a site I’ve long wanted to visit and one that did not disappoint us. Orchard Orioles sang from our parking lot, and migrants and southeastern breeders such as Prothonotary Warbler, Painted Bunting, and Summer Tanager lit up the roadsides.
We were especially eager to see Mottled Duck, and had great close views of birds perched and in flight; I hate to think how many Mottleds I’ve passed by in big flocks of American Black Ducks…. Marsh Wrens rattled and sang, and a couple of Soras joined the American Coots and Common Moorhens in the brushy ponds.
But the best bird was one I had not expected. While we were watching Blue-winged Teal and Green Herons, a big brown shape materialized out of the marsh and flew to the edge directly across from us, an American Bittern. It let us watch it for several minutes, its head pointed skyward as it gradually melted into the background until even through the scope it took great effort and more than a little imagination to pick it out A fantastic creature–but not the last one I would see on my April journeying!
Where I’ve Been and What I’ve Seen (I)
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Time away is a funny thing. It goes breathtakingly fast, particularly when it combines a great visit to Alison with some excellent birding. And yet fast as these last two weeks have gone, this morning when I got off the plane it seemed like an eternity since I’d been home.
An eternity filled with fun and with good birds, though. After a relaxing few days in Atlanta with Alison, we headed to the coast, where the Florida and Georgia Ornithological Societies were holding their joint spring meeting. On Saturday evening I delivered a lecture, “RTP’s RBI: How Roger Tory Peterson Founded Birding, Twice”; the talk was very well attended, and the snores from the audience were nicely drowned out by the very perceptive questions and comments that followed. It does the heart good to know how many birders actually think about their chosen sport.
The main point of the weekend, of course, was to spend time afield with the local experts, and Alison and I were as impressed by their skill as we were delighted with the birds they showed us. Jekyll Island truly is a paradise, and it was a rare treat to have the bird artist Lydia Thompson as our guide. Gray Kingbird was our special target, and Lydia led us right to them; we had fantastic close views of two birds as they hunted and squabbled from the telephone wires before flying into a tree for a little domestic bliss. Painted Buntings were another highlight, the first of the eastern subspecies Alison and I had seen.
Waterbirding was fantastic, of course. The Wood Stork colony was a great sight, with the huge birds surprisingly graceful in their treetop nests.
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We got to see a fine variety of herons, including Tricolored and Yellow-crowned Night-Herons. Loafing on the beach at the south end of the island was a fine flock of larids and shorebirds, and we spent a wonderful couple of hours sorting through them.
Wilson’s Plover eluded us, but a single Piping Plover was among the Black-bellied Plovers, Least Sandpipers, Sanderlings, and Dunlins. The tern flock included many Forster’s and Royal Terns, along with a few Black Skimmers and Least, Sandwich, Caspian, and Common Terns: a treat indeed for those of us from the southwest.
A great day that came to an end too soon!
