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.

 

 

 

Following up on a Mini-Oasis

After finding and describing a seep that created a mini-oasis in Pima Canyon Wash, I followed up on this spot on another visit a week later to see if there were any changes worth noting.  This spot is about 2½ miles from the parking area so I headed up there early on the morning of November 16th.  This time, I made this my destination and found myself a spot to sit and observe.  In the time span of only about 15 minutes, I counted 6 different species that came in to visit this area and its small pools of water:  Canyon Towhee, Black-throated Sparrow, 'Oregon' Dark-eyed Junco, Chipping Sparrow, Rock Wren, and House Finch.  Who knows what all I might have seen had I stayed there for several hours. This obviously shows how big of an impact this small mini-oasis can have on the various avian life and I am sure countless other wildlife and insects.

 Black-throated Sparrow

 Canyon Towhee

 Canyon Towhee

'Oregon' Dark-eyed Junco - was a bit shy and did not want to show its face!

As I was sitting on a rock observing this area, I happened to glance up in the sky and found a pair of Peregrine Falcons flying near the north ridge line of the canyon.  Yes, they were a bit high, but just being able to capture one photo for identity purposes was cool as this just added another species to my patch total for this spot.  

Peregrine Falcon

As I made my way back to the parking area after another successful trip to Pima Canyon, I encountered a stunningly beautiful male Costa's Hummingbird, a Ruby-crowned Kinglet that almost showed me its full ruby crown, and a pair of very obliging Loggerhead Shrikes.  

 Costa's Hummingbird

 Costa's Hummingbird

 Costa's Hummingbird

Ruby-crowned Kinglet

 Loggerhead Shrike - Number 1

Loggerhead Shrike - Number 2

Seems I find a new surprise just about every visit and I will be back for more.

  

Texas: Bolivar Flats Bird Sanctuary

After spending most of the morning at Anahuac NWR, on April 29, my next destination was the Bolivar Flats Bird Sanctuary near the tip of the Bolivar Peninsula. Another great place for birding, but a notice to anyone planning a visit to this beach area; wear long sleeve shirts and pants, no shorts.  Or maybe make sure you have insect repellent applied as there are some large flies there that can really bite and leave a welt.  I learned the hard way, but the birds were worth it.  

This is a great place to see lots of shorebirds, along with gulls and terns.  One of my target birds was the Piping Plover, a bird that is listed by IUCN, (International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) as 'near-threatened'.  Its breeding habitat is also popular with humans making its breeding efforts vulnerable.  Not only did I find this marvelous bird, but I found 6 of them!

  

Piping Plover

Piping Plover - there are 4 of them in this photo

Dunlin, Semipalmated Sandpipers and Wilson's Plovers were fairly common and could be seen running up and down the beaches.

Dunlin

Semipalmated Sandpiper

Wilson's Plover

Least Terns and Black Terns were also very common and the Least Terns were putting on a show with a male courting the female by offering her a small fish.

Black Tern and Least Tern

Least Tern

This spot is also a great spot for Reddish Egrets which is a species that I have seen in Arizona (rare) and also in Puerto Penasco, Mexico.  And I could see one far off in the distance, but upon closer inspection I found one a bit closer, but did not look quite like the normal bird that I have seen.  This one happened to be a much more uncommon color phase, the White-morph.  The distinctive bi-colored bill is the key field mark of all Reddish Egrets and helps to identify this bird and assure it is not a Snowy Egret or a juvenile Little Blue Heron.

White-morph Reddish Egret

One other bird of note was a fly-over by a Peregrine Falcon which looked a little out of place along a sandy shoreline.

Peregrine Falcon

After leaving this area I headed back and made a couple of stops along the way, including Roller Over Bridge.  This time and without extra people I was able to capture a couple extra photos of birds that I was not able to obtain with the group that I had the day before.

 Black-bellied Plover

 Black Skimmer

 Sanderling

Laughing Gull, Black Skimmer, Caspian, Royal and Forster's Terns

At another stop, a Willet was more than obliging for some photos.  This bird was very common just about any location where there was water.  The Willets in Texas have more of a brownish color than those in the west that tend to be gray.  They may appear to be a boring bird in the coloration department, but once they take flight, they are quite striking in appearance.  Just goes to show what is sometimes hidden in those wings.

 Willet

Willet

And the final bird?  Yes, another Common Nighthawk that landed in front of my car on a gravel road.  

Common Nighthawk

Day 3 comes to a close with an abundance of great birds and with one day left, I had to plan my time well to see what else I could add to my list of wonderful birds in Texas.

Tres Rios Wetlands-Again, 27 May 2012

What to do with a 3 day weekend?  Take advantage of the 3 days and go birding every day to a different location.  Weather was very nice with cool nights and warm days so after the Saturday trip to Sycamore Creek, decided it was time again to check out Tres Rios once more before the summer heat arrives.  Started off the day with a visit with the Burrowing Owls on Burrower's Row, (see previous post) which was done mostly from inside the vehicle.  Then it was time to get out and do some walking.  The west side of Tres Rios is birding by permission only and one has to get prior approval for parking near the gate and then venturing to the west area behind the closed gate.  So with one copy of my permission slip on the dash of my car and one copy in my pocket I headed out once again to explore the area. 

One of the first birds that I photographed was a Peregrine Falcon.  While these raptors are fairly common in the winter in Arizona, it was a bit of a surprise to find one still here at this time of the year.  Many, but not all, migrate to far northern climates for the summer.  And for the first time, I found one that was fairly approachable and allowed me to snap a couple of shots of it.  Their facial pattern is quite remarkable and they look so regal perched up high.

 Peregrine Falcon

Killdeer are so common and seen just about everywhere and really like to be heard.  Many times it is easy to ignore them, but they do some strange things at times maybe to just get attention.  This one was calling to make sure I heard it and then it would run a bit and stop to see if I was watching.  Then it would run a bit more, but this time it decided to try and hide behind a rock, thinking that I was not going to see it, but it did not fool me.  They can be so entertaining to watch their antics.

Killdeer



For those that think we do not have waders in Arizona, I just had to capture a photo of a Great Blue Heron.  These are really very common in Arizona, even though Arizona is part of the Sonoran Desert.  They can be found just about anywhere where there is water with fish.  This area in Tres Rios has a large population of these birds and in fact they even have a tree with a rookery of several nests that raise several young every year.  As this one shows, they quite frequently perch in trees.

Great Blue Heron



Also near this area I found several White-faced Ibis.  Most were easily spooked, but this one was hanging out with some Black-necked Stilts and allowed a bit more time for some photos.  It is a bird that can easily be confused with the Glossy Ibis, but the red eye is a sure sign of a White-faced Ibis.  The white face is evident on breeding adults.

White-faced Ibis



Just a bit past the spillway area is a small area going down near the river and the vegetation is very thick, so I just stood there watching the activity in the trees and during this time I was able to capture a photo of a Song Sparrow and also a Lazuli Bunting.  The bunting is a bird that is so colorful that they just try to make it difficult to those that want to take photos of them.  This photo is not bad, but would have loved to capture a front view with the cinnamon breast band.

Lazuli Bunting



Song Sparrow



Two more photos to round out this outing; one of an Ash-throated Flycatcher and the other of a Common Gallinule.  The flycatcher is a common bird in the summer in Arizona and have a subtle beauty to them even though they are not strong on bold colors.  The Common Gallinule was formally know as the Common Moorhen.  The name change took place just one year ago.  While they look a bit like the American Coot, they definitely have a bit more color to them.  They have already bred here in Arizona as I did see several chicks, but the ever-attentive parents quickly got the chicks to take cover when I approached too closely.

 Ash-throated Flycatcher

Common Gallinule



Will need to make some future trips out there again in the future, but with the heat starting to built for the summer, the trips will become less numerous until the fall night time temps start falling.