Arizona's Last Frontier - Part 1

Greenlee County, in far eastern Arizona, was the only county that I had not yet visited in Arizona.  Guess that qualifies it as my Last Frontier in Arizona.  This county is the most under-birded county in the state and it is Arizona's second smallest county and the smallest in population.  This county borders New Mexico on the east and is sandwiched between Apache and Graham Counties on the north and south, and is located in a very remote area.  Highway 191 that runs north and south is a very good highway, but once one heads north from the mining town of Morenci, it is slow driving on a mountainous stretch that is full of twists and turns, but the vastness of the area is stunningly beautiful.  Deserts in the south and mountains in the north.  It may be Arizona's second smallest county, but it is still larger in area than the state of Rhode Island

Good birding buddy Tommy D., and I decided to do some birding in Greenlee County as it was a place I had always wanted to visit but had never made it there in the past.  Tommy has been there recently in the past and knew where a lot of hotspots were located.  We planned our visit to coincide with the Global Big Day where eBird takes a snapshot of all the bird sighting data on one day of the year throughout the world. Since it is a very under-birded location, all of our reports for May 13 would get Greenlee County represented in the Global Big Day.

The first full day was a trip to the northern part of the county and it was a very full day.  Highway 191 is a very good road, but it is not a road one can travel very fast on due to the many twists and curves and switchbacks.  Once you head north from Clifton, you travel through the mining community of Morenci where one of the world's largest reserves of copper is located.  This is an interesting ride and it is hard to imagine the enormity of this mine until you drive through in daylight.

This day was spent in the higher elevations and with that type of habitat, many of our birds and other critters consisted of the types of animals that favor those habitats.  At one point as we rounded a curve, we had a Black Bear in the middle of the road and it took off running and disappeared into the brush on the side before I could get my camera ready.  The photos below are indicative of what we found up north.  We even venture to the isolated community of Blue, Arizona, which has a post office, a school and a library and in 2000, it had a population of 36 people!

Red-faced Warbler

Swainson's Hawk - This was one of my first birds in Greenlee County and this photo was taken late in the afternoon as we arrived on Thursday.

 Small but fascinating Aker Lake where we had American Three-toed Woodpecker and Purple Martin.

 American Three-toed Woodpecker

Click HERE for a link to a video of the woodpecker and its drumming.

Purple Martin

 Arachne Checkerspot

 Arachne Checkerspot

Common Black Hawk - They were seen in several places.

 Common Ringlet

 Dainty Sulphur

 Dusky-capped Flycatcher -We found 2 of them at the Upper Blue Campground, which was further north than previously reported for this species.

Click HERE to a link to a video of the Dusky-capped Flycatcher where it can clearly be heard calling.

Golden-crowned Kinglet - Hannagan Meadow Campground

 Greater Pewee - Blue River

 Marine Blue Butterfly

 Mountain Bluebird - Near Aker Lake

Friday was a very long day due to the distance we traveled and the many stops we made.  We were secretly hoping for Dusky Grouse in one o the many places we visited.  Habitat was very good, but the pesky grouse were not meant to be.  Stay tuned for part 2 of this adventure and my initiation to Greenlee County.  There is much more to come, including Saturday which was the Global Big Day.

   

Buckeye/Arlington for the Third Time!

On the last day of January I had planned on taking part in a birding field trip that was being led by an extraordinary young man to some spots in the west valley in and around Buckeye and Arlington.  I have been out west twice already in January, but knowing Caleb Strand and birding with him before, I knew how good he was and I wanted to join him and support him.  Friday the rains hit Arizona and the decision was made to postpone that birding outing because of the many roads that were not paved and would be muddy.  I had already made plans to ride with 3 other familiar and great birders; Susan Fishburn, Babs Buck, and Barb Meding.  Once the four of us heard of the cancelation, we got together and decided we would go out anyway and at least try to do some birding from the paved roads and I contacted Caleb to see if he would like to join us.  He was happy to join us and with the threat of possible rain showers on Saturday, the 5 of us headed out to see what we could find. 

 

With dark clouds and an overcast sky, we started out at the infamous Thrasher Spot.  First thrasher we heard and saw was Bendire's Thrasher, but our focus was the more difficult species, the Le Conte's Thrasher.  After a bit of walking around on the northeast side, we heard a Le Conte's singing in the distance.  Eventually we found it on top of a bush singing away.  While my photos on this day did not compare to the one a couple of weeks earlier, it is still a bird I will photograph anytime I can find it. We also had sparrows in the shrubs, but they were very reluctant to show themselves very well.  Of course the most common sparrow was the White-crowned Sparrow, but we also had Sagebrush Sparrows and Bell's Sparrows.  At least on this trip, I was able to get a photo of a Bell's Sparrow, which I missed last fall when I got my first view of them.

 

Le Conte's Thrasher



Bell's Sparrow

 

 The muddy roads definitely kept us away from many places that we have like to drive to so we were definitely put at a disadvantage.  A trip down Arlington School Road presented us with a few Vesper Sparrows and one that really fits the description of 'LBJ', Little Brown Job.  Many new birders are less intrigued with sparrows due to the difficulties of identifying some of them.  Yes, it takes a lot of exposure to them to start learning how to ID them, but they are definitely worth learning and getting to know.   

 Vesper Sparrow

Vesper Sparrow

 

Also along the paved roads we did spy a few raptors, including a very wet Osprey and a handsome Peregrine Falcon.

 

 Osprey

 Peregrine Falcon

Peregrine Falcon

 

The bird that presented us the best photo op was a Burrowing Owl.  We were all looking on the left side of the car for this bird when I turned around and there it was by the car on the right side.  The windows went down and the cameras started clicking. 

 

 Burrowing Owl

 Burrowing Owl

Burrowing Owl

 

The most exciting bird of the day, at least for me, was a bird that Caleb had discovered about a week before in his neighborhood.  The Greater Pewee is a summer resident in Arizona, so just being in Arizona this time of the year is rare.  When it is a resident, it is found in higher elevations, so this lower elevation added a bit more intrigue to the find.  I have seen this bird elsewhere in Arizona several times, but had never seen it in Maricopa County and figured that I would have to find it on Mt Ord sometime in the summer.  Caleb's find was definitely a great find and nice to add to my Maricopa list.

 

 Greater Pewee

 Greater Pewee

Greater Pewee

 

This may not be the most colorful blog post, but nonetheless, there are some great birds that we got to observe on a dark and dreary day in Arizona.  Thanks to Caleb for showing us around and thanks to Susan, Babs, and Barb for joining forces and making this a great day of birding.

 

 

 

Pinal Mountain Respite

On Saturday, July 19th, birding buddy and friend, Tommy DeBardeleben and I ventured east from the desert valley and the Phoenix area to check out the birding in this awesome place just a short distance to the east.  The Pinal Mountains rise to an elevation just a little shy of 8000'.  This place sort of reminds me of Mt Ord in Maricopa County but at a much larger scale as it covers a much larger area and has an elevation a little bit higher than Mt Ord.  Consequently, this results in a larger diversity of wildlife.

Starting out on Russell Road in Globe, a person can make many stops along the way and it is amazing how the habitat changes as the road slowly gains in elevation.  The birding is excellent in the lower elevations, and we did stop a few places to add birds to our list, but our ultimate goal was to reach the higher elevations and some of the specialty birds found there. One of the birds that we found was the Greater Pewee and both of us wanted to attempt to get some decent photos of this bird.  Definitely easier said than done.  These birds made us work for our photos and we still want better.  But I know I at least got some better photos than any I had gotten in the past.  Our first viewing was early morning where it was overcast (even a few drops of rain) and then the birds wanted to perch in some fairly dense shade and then usually up high.  We even bushwhacked up the slopes hoping to get up higher than the birds, so we could look down on them while they perched in trees lower down.  A couple of the males were singing which is how we located them, but they were a bit lazy in their song.  Their song is one of the funnest to set to words, "Jose, Jose Maria".  But the 2 we were hearing were dropping the last syllable and calling "Jose, Jose Marie".  Twas actually quite funny.

Greater Pewee

Greater Pewee

Greater Pewee

Greater Pewee - finally one in the sunlight but still far away

While the Greater Pewee did provide better photos than any I had in the past, it will continue to be a bird that I want to observe more often in the future.  Other birds that we encountered included Brown Creeper and Red-faced Warbler.  The Brown Creeper is a master of disguise and can be easily overlooked and is often detected by its high pitched calls to make a person aware that they are in the area and also by their movement.  They glean insects from the trunks of trees by landing close to the bottom of a tree then work their way up and around the trunk and once they are done with that tree they fly to the base of another nearby tree and start all over.  And the Red-faced Warbler?  Well, it kind of speaks for itself.  Probably the most dynamic warbler in the United States in my opinion.  Not very easy to get photos, but that is the case with most warblers.

Brown Creeper

Brown Creeper

Red-faced Warbler

Red-faced Warbler

At one place I walked back to the car while Tommy continued to do some bushwhacking and birding and a couple of birds made themselves available for photos; a male Black-headed Grosbeak and a Plumbeous Vireo.  

Black-headed Grosbeak

Plumbeous Vireo

A brief stop at Sulfide del Rey Picnic area gave us the Dusky-capped Flycatcher which is one of the sometimes hard-to-identify species in the myiarchus family. There are visual differences in the 3 to 4 species found in Arizona, but habitat and range along with the call notes is the most reliable way to ID these birds.

Dusky-capped Flycatcher

Once we reached the top of the mountain area, a visit to one of the cabins near the top really produced some great birds.  It was here that we discovered a Hairy Woodpecker nest cavity that had a lot of activity taking place.  This is woodpecker of higher elevations in Arizona and can be distinguished from the much more uncommon Downy Woodpecker by its large bill.

 Hairy Woodpecker - at nest cavity

Hairy Woodpecker - nest cavity up and to the right

In this same area we were visited by a first year Olive Warbler which always a cool bird to find as they are limited in range to high elevations only in Arizona and New Mexico in the United States.

Olive Warbler

The hummingbird feeders were attracting a lot of attention by several Broad-tailed Hummingbirds along with a couple of Magnificent Hummingbirds and a couple of Rufous Hummingbirds.  Obviously for me the Broad-tailed Hummingbirds provided me my best photos.

 Broad-tailed Hummingbird

Broad-tailed Hummingbird

As we descended back down the mountain we pulled off at a couple of spots to see what we could find and react to our pishing and one spot we kind of hit the jackpot with a Red-breasted Nuthatch that was very inquisitive and was begging for attention.  I have never before had a photo opportunity of this hyperactive little bird like this one.  This nuthatch species is most generally the hardest of the 3 species in Arizona to be found.  

 Red-breasted Nuthatch

 Red-breasted Nuthatch

 Red-breasted Nuthatch

Red-breasted Nuthatch

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, we had Mountain Chickadees that came in to our pishing as well.

Mountain Chickadee

The scenery in this area is enough justification to travel here, and then with the bird life as well, it is an awesome place to visit.  And to finish this post, I do have to thank Tommy DeBardeleben for sharing with me much of his knowledge about birding, especially in Maricopa County of Arizona.  Thanks to his great web site; http://www.birderfrommaricopa.com/ I have learned much about birding in Maricopa County and beyond.  I would not be as knowledgeable as I am today without his willingness to share and help me find birds.

Definitely a cool spot to visit when the heat of the desert gets to be too much!