California/Arizona, Feb 2011 - Day Six

Just before sunrise we awoke to the sounds of Mexican Jays moving around the canyon and within a few minutes we were up and ready to go. We made our way down to the Santa Rita Lodge, about midway up the canyon where there is a nice feeder station. We decided just to wait there while the birds woke up and warmed up (it was hovering around freezing at this point). In attendance at the feeders and surrounding trees were Bridled Titmouse, White-breasted Nuthatch, Pine Siskin, three subspecies of Dark-eyed Junco, Acorn Woodpecker, Hermit Thrush, Chipping Sparrow and a bright male Hepatic Tanager that made a quick pitstop. 

Acorn Woodpecker

Mexican Jay

Hepatic Tanager

We then decided to head down to the mouth of the canyon where it would be warmer in the early sunlight. There we stumbled across a mixed flock of sparrows containing White-crowned, Vesper, Sage, Brewer’s, Savannah, Song, and Lark Sparrows, Canyon and Green-tailed Towhees and a few Lark Buntings for a solid ten sparrow species in about fifteen minutes! Also around were Verdin, Black-tailed Gnatcatcher, Cactus Wren, Ladder-backed Woodpecker and Pyrrhuloxia. 

Brewer's Sparrows

Our next stop was at Peña Blanca Lake to look for the Least Grebes that were spending the winter there. In this venture we had some luck, eventually finding all six of them! Some other birds around the lake were Black Vulture, three species of swallows, Pied-billed Grebe, Bewick’s Wren, Lincoln’s and Rufous-crowned Sparrows, Winter and Rock Wrens, Sora, Gray Flycatcher, Orange-crowned Warbler and six species of ducks including Greater Scaup and a flock of “Mexican” Mallards.

On I-19 to Pena Blanca - notice the sign is metric!

Black Vulture

Least Grebe in bad light

After this rather quick stop we drove over to the Patagonia area via Nogales. Our first stop was at Patagonia Lake State Park where we had another shot at some Rufous-backed Robins, which of course we failed to find. We also missed the trogon that was wintering there. What we did find was White-throated Swift, Western Grebe, House Wren, Vermilion Flycatcher, Hammond’s and Gray Flycatchers, Plumbeous Vireo, Northern Cardinal, Great Blue Heron, Marsh Wren, Canvasback and some Double-crested Cormorants. Despite looking pretty thoroughly we couldn’t turn up a Neotropic Cormorant, which I had the last time I was there. 

Bridled Titmouse by the lake

One of the many belligerent cows at Patagonia Lake

Then it was off to the Paton’s famous feeders where we found Inca and White-winged Dove, Lazuli Bunting, Rufous and Anna’s Hummingbirds, Red-breasted Sapsucker and Gambel’s Quail in addition to the regular feeder birds. 

Anna's Hummingbird

Lazuli Bunting hiding behind the feeder pole

After watching the feeders and the skies for a while we made our way to the San Rafael Grasslands, just east of Patagonia. This area, while not the best for birding, was pretty awesome and definitely worth a visit. The highlight here by far was a herd of Pronghorns that allowed for good scope views. The few birds that we found while failing to find a Baird’s Sparrow were Northern Harrier, Grasshopper Sparrow, ‘Lillian’s’ Meadowlark, American Pipit, “Prairie” Merlin and a White-tailed Kite. 

Our first look at the Grasslands

Pronghorns!

Enjoying the open space

Random agave(?) plant

360º of grasslands

One last look at the Pronghorn

Afterwards we headed back to Patagonia for supper at the Wagon Wheel which had pretty good food, and then it was off on the long drive to Portal in the dark, where we camped up in Cave Creek Canyon under the millions of stars that we could see in the dry desert air. Unfortunately my camera decided it didn't want to take any pictures at this point in the day so my efforts at star shots were wasted!

California/Arizona, Feb 2011 - Day Five

Sorry it's been so long since I started recounting this trip! I've been pretty busy at my new job, which warrants its own post sometime soon. Anyway, back to the trip!

The day once again started bright and early as we headed to our next spot, the famous Salome-Baseline intersection just west of Buckeye, AZ where up to 5 species of thrashers can be seen in a morning. We got there just after sunrise and quickly found a singing Crissal Thrasher, which posed for great looks and close pictures in the morning sun. Also in the area were Western Meadowlark, Gambel’s Quail, Anna’s Hummingbird, Black-tailed Gnatcatcher and Loggerhead Shrike. We spent another hour or so wandering around the scrub trying to turn up another thrasher without much luck – at this point I decided to go wander off by myself, which turned out to be a bad decision! When I met back up with the other guys they told me they’d had Bendire’s and Le Conte’s Thrashers and a Costa’s Hummingbird, all of which would be lifers for me. After some searching I got to see the thrashers but missed the hummingbird. A few new birds for the day during the search were Abert’s Towhee, Brewer’s, Sage and Black-throated Sparrows, Ash-throated Flycatcher and Greater Roadrunner. 

Sunrise over Buckeye

 Searching the scrub

 Black-tailed Gnatcatcher

Crissal Thrasher

Crissal Thrasher with development

Then it was time to head off to Red Rock and the Santa Cruz flats via Phoenix for all-you-can eat pancakes. Our main targets here were the Ruddy Ground-doves and Rufous-backed Robins that were overwintering, along with Mountain Plovers and Crested Caracaras – we missed all of them which was rather unfortunate – some other people had seen all of them that day too! Some birds we did see included Prairie Falcon, Say’s Phoebe, Rock Wren, Orange-crowned Warbler, Chihuahuan Raven, Gila Woodpecker and a huge flock of blackbirds with thousands of Yellow-headed, Brewer’s and Red-winged Blackbirds and a few Brown-headed Cowbirds.

Looking for rarities near Red Rock

Our next stop was Sweetwater Wetlands in Tucson, a nice little oasis in the desert that was full of ducks. Species here included Black Phoebe, “Mexican” Mallard, Lincoln’s Sparrow, Northern Rough-winged Swallow, Cinnamon Teal, Black-throated Gray Warbler, Ladder-backed Woodpecker, Bufflehead, Lesser Goldfinch, Blue-gray Gnatcatcher and seven other species of ducks.

Black Phoebe

Northern Shoveler

 In the last hour or so of light we headed for Madera Canyon to see what we could pick up before dark. Not much as it turned out, but we had a very nice sunset to photograph. Bridled Titmouse, Mexican Jay, Red-naped Sapsucker and Phainopepla were all we saw up the canyon. After supper it was back into the canyon where we camped out for the night after finding a nice Whiskered Screech-Owl up at the top that didn’t seem to mind us standing almost right next to it. Several more birds called around our campsite as we fell asleep.

The entrance to Madera Canyon

Maderan Sunset

Whiskered Screech-Owl

California/Arizona, Feb 2011 - Day Four

Our third day in California once again started bright and early as we grabbed a quick breakfast, packed all our belongings into the van, and headed off to the famous Salton Sea for what turned out to be a great day of birding. At the north end of the sea, our first stop was at Bombay Beach, a little sketchy town right beside the water. A friendly dog came out to greet us, and we named it Jimmy, our trip mascot. In and along the sea, we found Black-necked Stilts, American White Pelicans, Eared and Western Grebes, and a nice adult Thayer's Gull amongst the hordes of California Gulls.

American White Pelican

 Black-necked Stilts

Josh with Jimmy

Moon over the Sea

After that quick stop, we worked our way down the 'coast' to the Wister wildlife management area, where we were greeted by Verdin, Black-tailed Gnatcatcher and Gambel's Quail among others. We continued on down a fairly muddy road and followed a side road over to the shore of the sea. The number of birds here was pretty incredible! Thousands of ducks, coots, gulls and shorebirds were out wandering around in the shallow water and there was a large flock of Audubon's Warblers working the bushes nearby. Included in the flock were Cinnamon and Green-winged Teal, American Wigeon, Lesser Scaup, Northern Pintail, Northern Shoveler, Gadwall, Marbled Godwit, American Avocet, Black-necked Stilt, Western Sandpiper, both Yellowlegs, Willet, Caspian Tern, American Coot, Snowy, Great and Cattle Egrets in nearby fields. Also out with the huge numbers of waterbirds were 3 Lesser Flamingos which was pretty cool. Another highlight at this stop was a Peregrine Falcon hunting the fields nearby. After thoroughly scanning through everything, we moved on into the agricultural fields nearby where we managed to find 2 Burrowing Owls right beside the road which posed for a few pictures at the mouth of their burrow. We also had a Ferruginous Hawk perched on a power pole.

Burrowing Owls

Snowy Egret

After that we headed to the Sonny Bono NWR and walked around the trails, picking up Common Ground-Dove, Greater Roadrunner, Abert's Towhee, many more Gambel's Quail, Verdin, and a Barn Owl which was roosting in a palm tree outside the visitor centre. On the road in we also had a flock of Snow Geese out in a field which was joined by quite a few Ross's Geese, White-faced Ibis and Long-billed Curlews.

2 Snow and 2 Ross's Geese allowing for good comparison!

Barn Owl

We then worked our way south to Brawley which supposedly has wintering passerines in their neighbourhoods and cemeteries. We didn't find much of anything here however, other than a White-winged Dove. Our next stop was at the Salton Sea National Wildlife Refuge where we worked through the many flocks of shorebirds and waterfowl, finding Redhead, Stilt Sandpiper, Wilson's Snipe and 'Yuma' Clapper Rails in addition to most of the birds we'd had earlier in the day. In the fields nearby we had our only Sandhill Cranes for the trip, along with more Snow and Canada Geese. In the distance along the shore of the Sea we could see many gulls and shorebirds, so we decided to make the long walk out there to try for one of our targets, Yellow-footed Gull. We ended up walking quite a ways up the shoreline in the baking sun, finding Snowy Plover, Dunlin and Black-bellied Plover in addition to the shorebirds, ducks, pelicans, coots, grebes and such that we'd already seen. We sorted through the flocks of gulls but it was all for naught as we didn't find a Yellow-footed. After what seemed like hours we were all dying of heat and thirst so we decided to give up and headed back to the van. Imagine our surprise when we discovered it was only 16ºC (61F)!!! Guess the Canadian winter was getting to us.

The barren wasteland around the Sea

We then worked our way west along the bottom of the Sea, stopping in at a few points to search for gulls without luck. After a while we decided it was getting a bit late so we high-tailed it up to our last stop in Salton City. This proved to be our lucky day as within a few minutes of arriving at the shoreline we'd picked up both of our targets - Pacific Golden-Plover and 2 Yellow-footed Gulls! We also added Bonaparte's Gull here with a small flock of them.

Pacific Golden-Plover

We ended up making the entire loop around the Salton Sea, following the sun so we always had nice lighting! At the end of the day we headed off to Buckeye, AZ where we camped in a trailer park under the millions of stars.

Palm Tree and stars in Buckeye

Our total for today was 103, not including the flamingos! Third day in a row of 100+!

California/Arizona, Feb 2011 - Day Three

Pier just north of Tijuana Slough, San Diego

Our second day in California (third day of the trip) started off bright and early with a Peregrine Falcon flying over our hotel as we checked out. We headed down to the famous Tijuana Slough shortly after sunrise to see what was around. As it turned out there was quite a bit! The visitor centre was closed but the area was well worth the visit with many shorebirds including Black-necked Stilt, Long-billed Curlew, Marbled Godwit, Least and Western Sandpipers, both Dowitchers, American Avocet, Whimbrel and Dunlin. In the marsh, waterfowl included Snow Goose, American Wigeon, Northern Shoveler, Northern Pintail, Lesser Scaup and Ruddy Ducks and there were Great and Snowy Egrets along with many 'Light-footed' Clapper Rails. Offshore there was a lot of activity with Western and Clark's Grebes, Pacific Loons, Heermann's Gulls, Brandt's Cormorant, Forster's, Caspian and Royal Terns and a Parasitic Jaeger. For land birds, we had American Kestrel, Northern Harrier, Anna's Hummingbird, Western Meadowlark, and 'Belding's' Savannah Sparrow along with a possible "Large-billed" Savannah Sparrow.

Western Gull

Tijuana Slough

Palm Trees in the Sunrise

 Marbled Godwit

 Anna's Hummingbird

From there we headed down to Borderfields State Park (I think that's what it's called anyway), stopping at a butterfly garden on the way which didn't seem to have many butterflies but definitely had a lot of birds! Here we added Pacific, Bewick's and House Wrens, Hutton's Vireo, Nuttall's Woodpecker, Western Scrub-Jay, Violet-Green Swallow, Orange-crowned, Yellow and both Myrtle and Audubon's Warblers, Pine Warbler (super-rare in SoCal apparently!) and Cassin's Kingbird. At the state park, we came across a road closed sign pretty much on the Mexico border so opted to walk up the road.

There wasn't actually a flood

We climbed up the hill in the background of the above photo, mainly to see what we could see but also to try and find some specialty birds. We had some luck with close views of a Wrentit along with California Thrasher and a White-tailed Kite flying over the fields. We also had an encounter with a friendly Border Patrol agent who checked our passports and commented on all our gear then bade us good day.

The view from the hilltop

From there it was off to Chula Vista to try for a Thick-billed Kingbird which had been hanging out for the past little while, but hadn't been reported for about a week. Turns out it was still around and we got good views of it within a few minutes of arriving!

Thick-billed Kingbird

After lunch at a Mexican restaurant which had delicious food, we headed up to La Jolla, just north of San Diego where the nice weather and the holiday meant that the streets were packed. We checked out the sea cliffs quickly and had a Ruddy Turnstone in with a few Black Turnstones, and offshore there were Brant, Pelagic Cormorants, and more of the same birds we'd had earlier in the day.

All three SoCal cormorants in one pic - can you spot them all?

Then it was a cruise around the neighbourhoods to look for parrots, a venture in which we had no success and very few birds around for our efforts. We decided to cut our losses and head up to San Dieguito River Park, where a road closure gave us a bit of trouble. We ended up getting to the park eventually after a bit of a detour, and in fading light explored the park. Our main target here was California Gnatcatcher, after missing them everywhere else during the day. We ended up missing them here too which was disappointing as we wouldn't be in their habitat again during the trip. The stop was well worth it though, as we added species like White-throated Swift, Gray Flycatcher, Western Bluebird, Great-tailed Grackle, more Cassin's Kingbirds, Lark Sparrow (nearby), Say's Phoebe and got good close looks at Clark's Grebes out on the lake. 

Part of the park

 Western Scrub-Jay

As the sun was setting, we headed off over the mountains to stay at a friend of the family's house in Desert Hot Springs, who graciously provided us with beds and a good meal (as well as leftovers for the next day). Thanks again!

Our day's total was 105 species, with Wrentit being my only lifer of the day. More to come soon!

California/Arizona, Feb 2011 - Day One/Two

Well, this was promised to be out a while ago so it's a little late, and I left my notebook in Guelph so might be a bit sketchy on details, but here goes:

Day 1, 2: Feb 19-20, 2011

Matt Strimas, Brett Fried and I hopped in a car with Josh Vandermeulen in the afternoon and headed for Detroit to catch out flights for what would be a pretty interesting 9 days. On the way we looked at all the cool Western birds we'd be seeing in the books, etc, while seeing Tundra Swans and Red-tailed Hawks and the like on the way. We ended up being a bit early for our flights so decided to wander around the Detroit airport a bit after going through security. One of the trip highlights actually came during the security screening when one of the x-ray operators asked if I was going on a mission! I explained that no, we weren't spies...just birders.

Cool tunnel in the Detroit airport

Anyway, the flight was fairly uneventful, and we arrived in Los Angeles a few hours later, collected the rental car, got some food, and found Josh standing by the side of the road at the airport after we'd gotten lost (he was on a different flight)! We ended up getting to the hostel at around 2 a.m., and had to leave at 3 a.m. to pick up John Garrett in Pasadena. So, we did what any sensible people would do, and used the time to get our gear ready and sorted instead of

sleeping! Then at 3 it was off to get John and head out on our (sort-of) Big Day. It turned out that we needn't have been so early, as it had snowed quite a bit overnight and the mountains were closed, cancelling our attempts at montane species (which we missed for the whole trip). Wait, what? Aren't we in southern California?! Why is there snow? Yep, we started the trip at a colder temperature and with more snow than we had left behind in Ontario. Great.

Snow in the mountains!

Red-naped Sapsucker

We spent part of the morning cruising around the snowy mountains of LA county, picking up birds such as California Quail, Red-naped Sapsucker, Anna's Hummingbird, Nuttall's Woodpecker, Oak Titmouse, California Towhee, Western Bluebird, and a few other western specialties, most of which were lifers for Brett, Josh, and Matt who hadn't really been out west before! Then it was down into the desert and farmlands, picking up Verdin, Black-throated and Sage Sparrows, Red Crossbill, Ferruginous Hawk, Loggerhead Shrike and Burrowing Owl. We stopped at a dried up riverbed that supposedly had Le Conte's Thrashers breeding in it - so, we wandered down it. Along the way down the wash, we had Rock Wren, Sage Sparrow and many White-crowned Sparrows. After a while, everyone was pretty much ready to head back to the car as we had other places to go, but I wanted to see this bird so I kept going. Perseverance ended up paying off, with a pair of them another hundred yards down the wash! We all ended up with good views before we had to work our way back to the car and move on.

Joshua Trees in the desert

Our next stop was at Apollo Park, with its cool entrance road song (if you go here, drive in the left-most lane and you'll know what I mean!). The main story here was the waterfowl, but we also had ridiculously good looks at Brewer's Blackbirds, California Gulls and some Violet-green Swallows. Snow, Ross's, Greater-white Fronted and Canada Geese were all seen at point-blank range, as well as Ruddy Ducks, Eared Grebes and several other duck species that we usually see way out on a lake or pond out east.

Ross's Goose

Brewer's Blackbird

Then it was two quick stops at Lake Palmdale and Malibu Creek SP, where we got California Thrasher, Bushtit, Canyon Wren, Spotted Towhee and Western Scrub-Jay. After that we headed to the coast, where some seawatching at Point Dume scored us Pacific Loon, Brown Pelican, Brandt's and Pelagic Cormorants, Western and Clark's Grebes, Snowy Egret, Heermann's Gull and Royal Tern. A little further down the coast, we stopped in at Malibu Lagoon, getting awesome looks at Snowy Plovers as well as Black-bellied Plover, Whimbrel, Sanderling, Willet and Least Sandpiper. Lots of ducks included Green-winged Teal and some Gadwall. Among the hordes of California Gulls we picked out Heermann's, Mew, Western, Glaucous-winged and Ring-billed. Our only Black Skimmers for the trip were seen here as well, and a bit of landbirding in the shrubs around the lagoons got us Allen's Hummingbird, Marsh Wren, Black Phoebe and a small flock of Bushtits. Then it was off into the depths of LA, where in fading light we realized that we didn't have any time to try for some other stuff, and brought John back to Pasadena, stopping in for some obliging Western Screech-Owls on the way. After dinner at a Lebanese restaurant somewhere in Pasadena, we headed off down the coast to our sketchy hotel in San Diego. It was a very long first day with a lot of driving around, but well worth it as we managed to see 131 species - half our total for the trip! I also got 4 lifers (Pacific Loon, Allen's Hummingbird, Le Conte's and California Thrashers).

Snowy Plover

Stay tuned for Day 3 and more adventures!

Hawks, Owls and Lights

That pretty much sums up the last few days in the Sault! First, some highlights... Red-bellied Woodpecker, Hoary Redpoll, Boreal Chickadee, Bohemian Waxwing and an early Orange-crowned Warbler, all on the bigby list! Hoary Redpoll is an extremely late bird. Warblers haven't quite shown up yet - there have only been 4 species reported so far which isn't all that surprising given it isn't May.

Now, on to the hawks. Did some hawkwatching from my deck and roof yesterday and today, with quite a bit of success! Totals were:

Broad-winged Hawk - 240

Sharp-shinned Hawk - 8

Turkey Vulture - 6

Red-tailed Hawk - 3

Bald Eagle - 3

Merlin - 2

Singles of Osprey, Northern Harrier, American Kestrel, Northern Goshawk, and Peregrine Falcon. The majority of these were today, ahead of a storm that's moving into the area now. Peregrine and Goshawk were both new for the yard list! Some other yard birds I got while hawkwatching were: Double-crested Cormorant, Bohemian Waxwing, Cliff Swallow and Northern Rough-winged Swallow.

Ken and I did one of his owl routes last night, with some success: 6 Barred, 2 Long-eared, 1 Northern Saw-whet, 1 Short-eared and 1 Boreal Owl were on the route, and part way through we were treated to a display of the Aurora Borealis (northern lights)!!! They were pretty faint with not much colour, but still cool to see. We also had decent numbers of ducks and some Brewer's Blackbirds on the drive out, along with 24 Greater Yellowlegs.

I still have a blog?

It would seem so, yes. I suppose I have a lot to catch up on, so look out for some posts in the near future (with pics! how exciting).

I'll put the less interesting stuff in this post...

March, after my return from a great trip (to be detailed later) was spent catching up on work and trying not to fail midterms that I'd missed a few classes for (due to said trip). Most new birds for me were seen through my window or on my way to/from school. A few highlights of this were Red-bellied Woodpecker, Common Raven (rare in Guelph) and a Cooper's Hawk that regularly hung out in the tree outside my window. A few trips in late March to find owls were unsuccessful, but we did find quite a few displaying woodcocks, including one in the field near my house. March 20 I took a short trip to Hamilton to try to find a Mountain Bluebird that was hanging out at a winery - no luck with this but did get some decent shots of a Horned Grebe coming into alternate plumage. April was exam time, so didn't really get out much... Made a trip up to Guelph Lake on April 20 after my last exam but was pretty windy and cold! April 22 I left Guelph and headed to Sudbury for Easter, had a good weekend visiting family. Now I'm back in the Sault and the birds are arriving! We've had system after system after system in the past few days, with a LOT of rain, but no rarities so far. Guess I'll have to keep looking.

Quick Post

What have I been up to recently, you may ask, that has caused me to become lax in my postings? School, pretty much. I went birding/photographing, rather unsuccessfully, in Hamilton back in mid-January - haven't been out since then which is kind of unfortunate. School's been piling on ever since the semester started (speaking of which, I have 2 assignments tomorrow, 2 midterms Thursday, and a formal lab writeup due Friday - hooray...).

On another note, I've been getting in a few hours here and there working on my website, which will hopefully be fully up and running by the end of March (depending on my school schedule). I know, I know, I said it'd be up in January...oh well. I've also decided to try to take some more interesting shots this year and experiment with my camera when I have some free time, here are a few of the results:

Frozen Waterfalls at Hiawatha

Ice build-up at Gros Cap

More to be posted on my Facebook page (David Bell Photography) in the future.

On yet another, more interesting, note - I'm heading to Southern California and Arizona on Saturday for 9 bird-filled days of (hopefully) sun and warmth. You can expect a post sometime after my return in March, which will surely be filled with some great photos and a recap of the trip.