Part 1 of an Awesome Week of Birding

It all started on February 3rd when I got back from youth group at my church; my Mom told me about a call we got from Mr. Tommy D, and he wanted to know if I could take a day out to the East Valley. Well, before I knew it I was in the car with Mr. Tommy and on my way to our first stop, Sunflower. Our target bird for Sunflower was the Evening Grosbeak. Mr. Troy had been here couple days before and he had three of these beautiful finches. As soon as we arrived in Sunflower we could hear them calling and when we looked up there was a flock of around thirty flying over us! By the end of our Sunflower stop we had a conservative estimate of 60 EVGRs!

Evening Grosbeaks

There were also a lot of Cassin's Finches in the area as well.

Cassin's Finches

Here are some photos of the other birds and wildlife around Sunflower as well as a shot of the area.

Northern Cardinal

Townsend's Solitaire

Coues White-tailed Deer

After having an amazing morning in Sunflower and seeing many new birds for my Maricopa County list, we drove over to the Maricopa side of Mt. Ord. Both Mr. Tommy and I love birding in higher elevations, and we always hope to find something super awesome, like a Spotted Owl on its day roost or a Pine Grosbeak on the top of a tall pine. But, even if we don't find anything out of the ordinary it's still fun getting to watch those higher elevation species! Once we started birding the 1688 trail we could hear Red Crossbills, Hutton's Vireos, Pygmy, and White-breasted Nuthatches, and there was even a Red-naped Sapsucker giving its mew call.

Red-naped Sapsucker

Pygmy Nuthatch

After we reached the end of the trail and started heading back I heard what I believed was a Golden-crowned Kinglet, but the Brown Creeper sounds very similar. As we started scanning through the many Ruby-crowned Kinglets one caught my eye, and guess what it was; that's right, my lifer Golden-crowned Kinglet!

Golden-crowned Kinglet--Lifer!!!

After watching the kinglet for a good ten minutes Mr. Tommy heard an Olive Warbler singing and before we knew it, the OLWA was in the same tree as the GCKI!

Olive Warbler

Before we ended our Mt. Ord expedition we came across a Red Crossbill high in a tree.

Red Crossbill

Mr. Tommy also spotted this tarantula.

Here are a couple of photos of the scenery from the 1688 trail.

Our next stop after Mt. Ord was Coon Bluff along the Salt River. I have never gone birding around this area so it was awesome getting to explore a new area in Maricopa County! Our target bird for this stop was a Harris's Sparrow that has been hanging out with a small flock of White-crowned Sparrows. Mr. Tommy and I searched the area a few times and had several flocks of white-crowns, but no Harris's. We did, however, have a couple of nice flocks of Cedar Waxwings.

Cedar Waxwings

After missing our target bird at Coon Bluff we made our last stop of the day at the Gilbert Water Ranch. Our target bird was the Brown Thrash that spent the winter here but had not been reported for a couple of weeks. I had already gone out searching for this bird twice and I missed it by just a few minutes! So I was very eager to find this bird. As we made our way to the thrasher spot we ran into a Harris's Hawk, at least we got one Harris's that day!

Harris's Hawk floating--On a light pole!

As we approached the spot where the thrasher had been seen, we flushed a rufous backed thrasher out of the middle of the trail! As soon as the bird landed on the side of the trail we knew it was the Brown Thrasher! The bird only stayed still for a second or two but it was unmistakable! We then stayed in the spot for a few more minutes without the bird coming out, so we decided to make a quick loop around the preserve one more time to give the bird a little time to calm down. As we walked around the preserve Mr. Tommy spotted this hybrid Cinnamon X Green-winged Teal.

Cinnamon X Green-winged Teal Hybrid

After watching the teal for a minute or so we hiked over to the thrasher spot again. Even though the sun was starting to set I was still determined to get better looks! After walking back and forth through the area a couple of times our hopes started to fade. But as I looked through the super thick salt bushes I could see a medium sized bird preening its self. Once I lifted my binos onto the bird I saw it was the thrasher! 

Brown Thrasher--Lifer!!!

The bird then started skulking down low in the brush and then the thrasher got scared up by a mockingbird and landed in a reasonably good peach. Even though the sun had already set I was able to get a few diagnostic photos.

By the end of the day I got many Maricopers, two lifers (GCKI and BRTH), and we ended the day with 110 species of bird!!! Thanks Mr. Tommy for the amazingly-awesome day of birding!

Exploring the Prescott area

Prescott is a very nice area to bird. It has lots of habitats and with many habitats come many birds! Prescott is located in northern Yavapai, a county that I only have 93 species in (as of now), so I made a few calls and wrote a few emails and after a few replies made a trip on October 23rd to the Prescott area with Mr. Joe Ford, Mr. Paul Doucett, Ms. Haylie Hewitt, and my brother David. We visited Watson Lake, Granite Basin Lake, and Willow Lake. I had two target birds and they were Wood Duck and Cassin's Finch, I have seen WODU's a few times but I can never get tired of that bird, and anyways I don't have WODU on my year list yet. When we parked the car I could see that there was some nice riparian habitat that went into the lake. Here are a couple photos of Watson Lake and the surrounding habitat.

 

We were only the 2nd car in the parking lot when we arrived, but that changed pretty quickly! There were bikers, hikers, and I even ran into Yavapai's eBird reviewer Steven Burk. While we were walking along the main trail I spied this mannequin taking a rest against a building!

Okay now that was a little strange, but it got even stranger when I heard a high pitched whistle that sounded like a hawk but was not loud enough, so I walked to where I heard it and found three Wood Ducks! Here is a photo of a female and male. One out of two booya!

Unfortunatly no one else was able see them, but they did hear them. Right after the WODU's took flight I could hear some fledgeling Pied-billed Grebes begging, so I started hiking towards them and was able to witness an adult PBGR feed a fish to one of its three fledgelings. At first the fish looked to big for the youngling to swallow, but after a few attempts he gulped that sucker down!

It just happened that there was a Neotropic Cormorant right above the grebes.

 I wonder what the cormorant thinks of the grebes???

There was a large variety of birds on and around Watson Lake, birds ranging from sparrows, warblers, and woodpeckers to ducks herons and grebes. Here are a few other birds we saw on the pleasant walk.
                                                                    Bewick's Wren

                                                                                Bushtit

 

 

Gadwall

 We ended Watson Lake with 50 species of bird and quite a few highlights in there as well. Our next stop was Granite Basin Lake, according to eBird this was going to be quite a birdy area and a birdy area it was! I even got a lifer. But you will have to wait to find out.

Once we arrived at the camping area where we ate our lunch I headed out to find some birds. It didn't take long for me to find a beautiful adult Townsend's Solitaire that flycatched right in front of my face, but of course I was not able to photograph the awesome moment, instead here is a distant photo!

After eating lunch we drove down to the lake where we spent quite a bit of time birding the riparian area.
                                                                   Granite Basin Lake

 While we birded the riparian area we had a good amount of species, one of the highlights was a flock of 5 Red-naped Sapsuckers in a single tree! We also had an Acorn Woodpeckers at its stash tree.

After observing the clown like woodpecker at his man-cave I spied my lifer Cassin's Finch on top of a very tall pine!                                    

Right when I saw the bird I snapped a couple of photos then I tried to point the bird out to everyone but failed, only a couple of people saw it but even then they didn't see anything different about the bird. I still wanted to get better looks at one, but I didn't think that was going to happen. As we birded the same trails around again I spied yet another female only this time everyone got great looks!

                                                                      Cassin's Finch!!!

From left to right: Mr. Paul Doucett, my brother David, Mr. Joe Ford, and Ms. Haylie Hewitt

The Cassin's Finch was a life bird for all of us exept for Mr. Ford who saw his only one in Colorado. After Granite Basin Lake we made our last stop of the day to Willow Lake. Once we arrived at the parking lot we spied a Merlin and a pair of Bald Eagles!

 You can barely see in the photos but the eagles are sporting some nice bling-bling on their legs!

I can never get tired of seeing BAEA's they are just so majestic! We then started hiking on the trail going down toward the lake when my brother spied a Greater Roadrunner that ran under a bush, so I walked over to the bush and got a killer face shot of this awesome ground-cuckoo!

While I was down under the bush trying to get a clear photo without sticks in the birds face I heard the distinctive flight call of the Lawrence's Goldfinch, but as I got out of the bush I could not see the bird. We then hiked a bit further to where we could start scoping out the lake. When we stopped I could hear the begging calls of a fledgeling Anna's Hummingbird and when I looked up I was greeted by this sight.

We were surprised to see a Cattle Egret (our first egret of the day) along the shore.

CAEG then flew on to a island and then GREG flew with CAEG and I got a photo of GREG taking CAEG's spot, and in all of that is a GBHE.

 I ended the day with 36 Yavapers (first for Yavapai) which brought my Yavapai list up to 129! Before I end this post here are a couple of photos of Willow Lake.

Thanks Mr. Ford, Mr. Paul, Ms. Haylie, and David for the awesome day of birding!