California Specialties

The main target bird, the Island Scrub-Jay, was covered in my previous post, but I had a couple more to look for as well, but these birds are non-natives, and have established breeding populations in the United States and are ABA countable.  So I figured that I might as well put some time and effort in trying to locate these other 2 species.  

The first one is the Red-whiskered Bulbul, which is native to tropical Asia and was introduced to the United States.  With a little research, I discovered that the Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanical Gardens might be the best place to find this bird.  It did not take long to find one either.  As soon as I got out of my vehicle in the parking lot, the first thing I heard was Indian Peafowl, which everyone is familiar with, and the 2nd one was an unusual song that I had not heard before and it did not take long to pinpoint the source; a Red-whiskered Bulbul near the top of a tree in the parking lot.  Once I got inside, I found out that they were quite numerous and they are very vocal, so it was not hard to locate many more.

Red-whiskered Bulbul

As mentioned in my previous post, I was captivated by all the Allen's Hummingbirds and the chance to get some respectable photos of them.  

Allen's Hummingbird

Indian Peafowl were introduced to this site in the late 1800's and they are thriving, breeding, and well established at this location.  Have always loved the colors of these large birds.

Indian Peafowl - Male

Female

From this spot, I then traveled to the Sepulveda Basin Wildlife area and Balboa Lake, which are fairly close together and just separated by a golf course.  And I got a nice assortment of birds there as well.  

A leucistic American Coot - rather attractive for a coot!

Bushtit - Sure looks different from those in Arizona

California Gull

California Towhee

Egyptian Goose

A hybrid goose of some sort

Song Sparrow (ssp heermanni) - Much different than what we have in Arizona

Found a couple of lizards as well and not being real familiar with the species found in California, I had to rely on some of the experts on iNaturalist.org to supply an ID for them.  

Great Basin Fence Lizard

Western Fence Lizard

The Santa Cruz Island trip was wedged in between my arrival date and my departure date.  (See previous post.)  On my last day I had enough time to chase another countable non-native bird that is established in California; the Spotted Dove.  I had spent a lot of time researching in the weeks before my visit, to find out where it was being reported this year.  Incredibly, it was not being reported at any eBird Hotspots, so I had to make my way to the intersection of a couple of cross streets to begin my trek.  Who says you can't do any good birding at Home Depot or Target?  I had to walk up and down a street behind those two businesses that was lined with residences on one side.  Birding in and around a residence has to be done a bit judiciously.  Most people are not fond of people with binoculars and a camera probing their yards.  I walked this street from one end to the other and finally decided I was going to have to give up.  About a block from the car on my return, I saw a Mourning Dove fly up to an electrical line and shortly after, another dove-like bird fly to a line nearby.  Got my binoculars up and sure enough, there was a Spotted Dove.  Quickly took a couple of distant photos and then tried to get to an area with a closer view and by that time it was gone.  Talk about a last minute find!

Spotted Dove

I had time for one more stop before heading back to the airport in Burbank, so I headed to the San Gabriel River Parkway Nature Trail.  Nothing new, but got to view and photograph a couple of cool birds.

 Blue-gray Gnatcatcher

 Cassin's Kingbird

California Scrub-Jay

Yes, the time flew by very quickly, but being able to notch a few more life birds made the trip all worthwhile.  New adventures await me in the next few months of 2017.  Hope they are successful.  

  

California: Coast to Mountains

Our 3rd day in California was the day to return to Arizona.  Tommy and I had already decided we wanted to check out Laguna Resort in the mountains about an hour out of San Diego, but we also wanted to get some breakfast to start off the day.  We had talked briefly a few times about maybe searching for the Red-crowned Parrot that now has large enough numbers and are breeding freely in southern California.  They can be found in the San Diego and Los Angeles areas, but we really had not gotten too serious about locating them to add them to our life list.  Even though this species is now accepted as an ABA reportable bird, somehow if feels weird adding a life bird to one's list that is not a native to the United States.  But then, when one thinks about it a little more, then I suppose that if we are going to  follow that standard, we probably should not count House Sparrows, European Starlings, Eurasian-collared Doves, and a whole slew of game birds that have all been introduced. 

But fate stepped in when we pulled into the parking lot at Denny's for breakfast and we heard the unmistakable calls of parrots in the air.  It did not take long to see them flying overhead in small flocks and landing a block or two away.  Too easy!  The chase was on and we finally located and saw over 20 parrots. 

 Red-crowned Parrot

Red-crowned Parrot - juvenile

We just added a new life bird without much difficulty and after a hearty breakfast, we then headed east with Laguna Resort as our next target location.  This place is in the mountains east of San Diego and although we stopped here on our way in on Friday, it was pouring rain so this visit would be much better weather wise.  We did have a target here, so there was a reason to check it out.  We had did a little researching on eBird and found that this location was one of the most southerly locations with resident Purple Finches.  Believe it or not, this would be a life bird for both of us.  The place was full of higher elevation birds and many were common to Arizona, but we focused on locating Purple Finches.  In the process we did locate a Swainson's Thrush and a couple of Band-tailed Pigeons.

 Band-tailed Pigeon

Swainson's Thrush

And in the same vicinity we found our target bird the Purple Finch.  There were several of them, but photographing them was a bit of a challenge as they did not like to expose themselves to sunlight.  They can be identified from House Finches due to the reddish/raspberry color in the brown feathers on their wings.  They kind of look like they have been dipped in raspberry sauce.

 Purple Finch

Purple Finch

So for the final day, I tallied 2 more life birds for a total of 6 during our 3 day epic trip.  Once we left Laguna Resort and headed east, I was rather interested in stopping at a another location, Kitchen Creek Road which was on the east side of Laguna Resort but at a much lower altitude.  Tommy had gotten photos of a Wrentit in this area a year before and although I had gotten very brief glimpses of this cool little bird in September 2013, I had not gotten good looks of them and no photos.  Well this time was a much better experience because we had 4 of them show themselves for photos.

 Wrentit

 Wrentit

 Wrentit

Wrentit

And for a final and last stop we visited Cibbets Flat Campground to check it out before we took the long trip home. 

 Steller's Jay

 California Scrub-Jay

It was an awesome 3 days of birding and exploring some new birding spots and was well worth the trip by adding 6 new life birds to my list.  And I believe Tommy added 14 new birds to his life list as well.