The Salt/Verde River Christmas Bird Count

Today on December 14th, I decided to participate in the Christmas Bird Count for the Salt/Verde River as I wanted to help with the count and enjoy the area.  I called my friend Kurt Radamaker, who is also the compiler of the count, and we talked about the birding areas in the count and it worked out that I would cover Area 3 within the count circle.  This count is one that's awesome, and one that is largely on Ft. McDowell Reservation Land.  Kurt gave me one of the permits and I was good to go, as the reservation gives permits to birders once a year during this time.  It's a great place to explore, and with it being a once a year opportunity at most for access to the land, it's good to get out there.  I got there at dawn, and went to the east side of the Verde River to access my area.  After crossing the river going northbound on Highway 87, I took the first left onto a road, which is BIA 51 for several miles to get where I needed to go.  I passed the popular Ft. McDowell Adventures turnoff, and I kept going when the road turned to dirt, was a little rough, and was narrow.  I took my truck to my first stop, which was where BIA 51 intersected with Sycamore Creek.  There were a few spots near the intersection to park, and after parking I loaded up my gear for the day and hiked 0.8 miles to the Verde River.  From the start, the place was active with lots of birds to count, and I knew it would be a busy day.  Once I got to the Verde River, I decided to keep on going north which would result in me being on foot all day.  When I headed north I decided I would stay along the river for over 5 miles of hiking through a variety of terrain (from easy to challenging), and when I would return southbound I decided I would follow BIA 51 back for another 5-6 miles to where I parked at the BIA 51/Sycamore Creek intersection.  With lots of new ground to explore (I've never covered this stretch of the east side of the Verde) and with having a few locations in mind that Kurt told me about within the area, I knew the day would be awesome.

From the getgo, I had fun when I got out of my truck and heard many American Crows calling.  Crows are annual visitors to the Ft. McDowell Reservation lands during winter, and they are often found in the pecan groves and along the river in smaller numbers among Common Ravens.  This year there are irruptions of different species throughout Arizona and the American Crows today where a similar example.  As I hiked toward the river, I heard them calling constantly, and eventually I started to see flocks of them flying to the southwest.  To my surprise, I counted over 300 of them quickly, all of which were birds headed to the southwest.  When some birds flew in from the west side of the river, I wasn't sure if they were returning birds after they seemingly dispersed for morning flight.  Throughout the hike, I saw more and more of them, but I left my count at 315 birds to prevent errors even though I believe there were at least 500 of them.  At times there'd be random groups of them sitting in cottonwoods or flying around together in groups of close to 50 birds in mesquite bosque habitat.  It was fun to observe, as my observations with American Crows today are now the best I've had of the species in Maricopa County.

As I hiked north and stayed close to the Verde River during my outbound hike, I birded in cottonwood and willow riparian groves along the river (which did have mesquite and tamarisk mixed in in a lot of locations), mesquite, and Sonoran desert scrub.  My outbound hike ended at a mature and large mesquite bosque at over 5 miles of hiking north.  The return hike on BIA 51 was in desert scrub habitat.  I loved the area and hope to return again.  More about the birds encountered, my total was 73 species in over 10 hours spent hiking in what was an 11-12 mile round trip overall.  Other rarities I encountered was an adult male Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, a Golden-crowned Kinglet, a flyover Red Crossbill (who are irrupting this year), a White-throated Sparrow, and a Northern Parula.  Another good bird for the count was 6 Woodhouse's Scrub-Jays.  Kurt told me it's been years since they've been found on the count, and they've also been irrupting into lower elevations than usual this year.  Among the other birds in the 73 species I detected were 7 Common Merganser, 10 Wilson's Snipe, 3 Bald Eagle (including a pair on a nest-very cool), Harris's Hawk, Great Horned Owl, 2 Dusky Flycatchers, 2 Brown Creepers, 120 Western Bluebirds, over 250 Yellow-rumped Warblers, and up to 7 Black-throated Gray Warblers.  My full list is on eBird at the link here below:

https://ebird.org/checklist/S123989300

Common Mergansers 

Spotted Sandpiper 

Greater Yellowlegs 

American Kestrel

Golden-crowned Kinglet 

Hermit Thrush

Phainopepla with a Snowy background 

White-throated Sparrow 

Orange-crowned Warbler

Northern Parula 

The day today can be summed with approach of "field birding", which is my favorite.  You park and walk for miles on foot all day and it rocks.  I packed lunch, snacks, and 8 bottles of water.  When I started birding I used the eBird application for everything.  In under an hour my phone battery went from 100 to 75%, which was gonna die fast with keeping tallies.  A handy tool I brought just in case was a pen and sheet of paper.  I tallied the abundant species by 5's (example: Yellow-rumped Warbler, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, etc.), and the less abundant species by 1's.  For any species that was new for the day, I would use the eBird app for that.  It worked out well, and with cold hands it was easier to use a pen and paper for tallying lots of the birds.  A fun one in the field, hopefully I'll get the chance to participate in this count again.  To close, here's a few pictures of the area, as well as the forms used for our final tally to turn into Kurt for compilation.  

January 4th: A Day of Exploring

My alarm didn't go off quite the way I wanted it to this morning, so I slept through it.  Another thing that could have happened was that I've been so tired lately that maybe I slept through the alarm and had the natural amount of sleep my body needed.  Who knows.

My desired location to explore today was the northern portion of Gila County, east of Payson, just below the Mogollon Rim and west of Forest Lakes.  Since I got up late, I didn't think at first I would go through with that plan.  After sitting around for an hour thinking of what to do, I stuck with my plan.  Lately I haven't been exploring places that others have explored all that much.  I really like that idea of finding my own things, unless someone reports something new for Maricopa County that I don't have, OR if there is a reliable Gila County lifer somewhere OR if some lifer shows up in Arizona that can't be missed.  Pine Grosbeaks that Jason Wilder recently found at Snowbowl in Coconino County north of Flagstaff really had my attention.  Coconino is probably the next county I'll try and get 200 species in.  I had second thoughts though, and decided that I would try and find my own notable bird in the mountains of northern Gila County just below the cliffs and slopes of the Mogollon Rim.  I didn't have anything notable by the end of the day, but you can't succeed if you don't try.  I was hoping for a Nutcracker, or with a lot of luck, a rare finch of some sort.  Even a Gila County American Three-toed Woodpecker would have been awesome.  Or a Gila County Northern Goshawk.  I didn't get anything to scream about, but I did get good exploring and scouting in for when I return to explore the area further.  Spots I explored were Sinkhole Trail 179 from the 260 Trailhead, Christopher Creek via See Canyon, and the Tonto Creek Fish Hatchery.  Bird highlights did include Williamson's Sapsucker, Red Crossbill, Pacific Wren, Golden-crowned Kinglet, and a Greater Roadrunner in midst of pine and Gambel's oak forest.  It was the strangest habitat I've seen roadrunner in, and most of the forest was ponderosa pine.  Scrubby habitat of some sort wasn't close by.  Anyways, a beautiful area to explore and bird.

Photo wise, this Mountain Chickadee was cooperative and was awesome!

This Golden-crowned Kinglet was much higher than the Chickadee, but it is always a fun bird to see.

I checked up on Green Valley Park in Payson just in case a Cackling Goose would be back in play with the many Canada Goose there.  No Cackling.  But this Snow Goose was there, sleeping, and then, woken up from it's sleep.  I don't think I've ever seen a bird look this tired..

Maricopa Madness: The Push to 325

I've been exhausted lately.  Days and days have been spent in the field for my Maricopa County Big Year.  I'll go birding before work and I'll go birding after work.  I'll bird all day on days off.  We last left off with my additions of Northern Parula to the Big Year and then a remarkable discovery at Veterans Oasis Park in Chandler, my lifer Groove-billed Ani.

About a week after the Groove-billed Ani excitement in Chandler, Gordon Karre and I made a trip up to Slate Creek Divide on November 23rd to try and find some key high elevation birds for our Maricopa County Big Years.  Yes, that's right, Gordon is doing a Maricopa County Big Year too.  We found plenty of key birds.  A painful miss was a heard only woodpecker that was very likely a Downy Woodpecker.  How likely?  Well, the only other thing it could have been was a Ladder-backed Woodpecker.  There have been a few times where I have found Ladder-backed Woodpeckers in higher elevations, even higher in elevation that at Slate Creek Divide.  Although we couldn't find the likely Downy, the Douglas fir stands at Slate Creek harbored my 318th year bird in a flock of Golden-crowned Kinglets.

Later that day on the 23rd, a Ruddy Ground-Dove was reported at Celaya Park in Tempe by Dave Hawksworth, a visiting birder from New Mexico.  While Gordon's house was only minutes away from this park, he went to investigate the report and found there was a Ruddy Ground-Dove present on the 24th, which was Thanksgiving Day.  I rushed to the park and Gordon kindly waited for me to get there.  Just before I got there, a group of kids playing basketball flushed the Ruddy Ground-Dove.  Gordon was furious.  With basketball being an equally big passion of mine as birding is, I couldn't get mad at the ballers.  While waiting, Dave Hawksworth joined us and soon after, Inca Doves started to fly to the ground.  Eventually, the Ruddy Ground-Dove joined the Incas and became my 319th bird of the Big Year.  Thanks Dave!

In Mesa on November 26th, Jack Sheldon found a Harris's Sparrow coming to his yard to feed at his feeders.  On the 27th, Gordon Karre, Barb Meding, and I all got permission from Jack to look for his sparrow.  With me having to be at work by 1 P.M., I chased the sparrow after 11 A.M. which would only give me 30 minutes to look.  Jack and his wife were very accommodating to us and kindly let us peek over their wall.  Several neighbors of Jacks became very concerned and were considering calling the police as I learned later.  But with 10 minutes left on the clock, the Harris's Sparrow made it's appearance to be my 320th bird.  It was awesome, thanks Jack!

You might be wondering what happens on days in between of when I get year birds.  You can consider those days as searches and strikeouts.  Still good birding though!

As December rolled in, the first excitement came on the 2nd.  A Tundra Swan was reported in Sun City West, and Melanie Herring found a Ross's Goose at Lower River Road Ponds near Buckeye.  Ross's Goose was the last easy bird I needed for my Big Year.  I decided to make a loop out of Lower River Road Ponds and Sun City West after work that day.  Arriving at the Lower River Road Ponds, it didn't take me long to find the Ross's Goose, who was with 2 Snow Geese.  It's fun to save a bird with the number of 321 later in the year like this Ross's Goose.

The Tundra Swan was interesting to say the least.  It showed up at a golf course in Sun City West and was hanging out with a golf course pet Mute Swan.  I didn't know what to think of the Tundra's origin, but I did not think it was wild at first, not even a slight chance.  However, both of it's hallux were intact and I also remember having a Tundra Swan in this area several years back.  The one several years back was said to be wild by Sun City residents, as it would stay the winter and leave in the spring.  Turns out this bird is that same bird, and the residents said it had just returned for the winter again, and it leaves in spring.  Thanks to Chris Rohrer and Magill Weber, they were able to lock down this information.  This bird seems like a wild bird so I decided to count it, even though it is very used to people.  A lot of winter waterfowl will eventually become used to people when they winter here.  But this is flat out weird..

On December 3rd, Troy Corman found a Hooded Warbler at Seven Springs Wash and it was a nice adult male bird.  With me having work the next day on December 4th, I decided to go for the warbler before work where it would be one of my longer chases during the Big Year on a work day.  Ironically, I was about to walk down Seven Springs Wash in the previous week and I decided not to.  The Hooded Warbler is one I had only seen once in my life prior to this chase, and it was a female at Morgan City Wash in 2009.  The first Hooded Warbler eluded my camera, which made me want to see this bird even more and get a photo of it.  I walked through the canyon at Seven Springs Wash slowly and because the sunshine hadn't hit the area where the warbler was on my way down the canyon, I would walk back up canyon and move even slower when birds would become more active.  This technique worked out well for me as I discovered my 323rd year bird for Maricopa County, a Pacific Wren!  The tiny bird was located by it's distinctive double-call notes, which sound reminiscent to that of a Wilson's Warbler.

Pacific Wren seems to be a lot more rare in Maricopa County than the extremely similar Winter Wren that it has recently been split off from.  I've found 4 Winter Wrens this winter and this Pacific Wren was in no doubt overdue.

While the Pacific Wren had made my trek, I was still hoping to find the Hooded Warbler.  I moved up the wash as slow as I could and listened carefully for it's call notes.  When I came across a loud spring of water flowing through the wash, I had the feeling to walk away from the loud noise.  As soon as I got away from it, I heard the call note of the Hooded Warbler!  I rushed in the direction of the call and was able to spy the bird.  I performed my own victory dance before getting down to business.  While the Hooded Warbler turned out to be very skittish, it took me awhile to finally snap a few pictures of it.  This sighting was epic for me, as I hadn't seen a Hooded Warbler since the year of 2009.  Thanks Troy!

Following December 4th and already having 4 year birds to start December, the reality of the game set in as I searched and searched for more year birds throughout the entire following week without any additions.  In places I have been to lately, awesome birds were found.  A few days after I was on Mount Ord, Charlie Babbitt found a Downy Woodpecker in the same area I was birding.  Jeff Ritz found a stunning Lesser Black-backed Gull at Glendale Recharge Ponds, the closest hotspot to my home.  It didn't stick around very long.  On Saturday the 10th I went to Lake Pleasant, but windy conditions made viewing difficult and I didn't have a lot of patience.  Caleb went there later in the day and found a Long-tailed Duck flying south over the lake!  I wondered if I had overlooked the duck earlier in the morning.  Long-tailed Duck is a species that dives a lot, and with the constant waves that were created by the wind, it would be very hard to pick a bird like that out.

Something crazy happened though on the 11th, and several Long-tailed Ducks were found in Arizona.  Luckily Louis Hoeniger was at Glendale Recharge Ponds and he discovered a Long-tailed Duck there in Basin 5.  Ironically, I got to see my first ever Long-tailed Duck here in 2013 on Christmas Eve, in the same exact basin.  I was at work when the bird was found, and fortunately, the bird was still there when I arrived to become my 325th bird!  The Long-tailed Duck is quite the stunning duck, especially an adult male.  This one at Glendale dove constantly, and would only surface for about 3-5 seconds before diving under water for longer periods of time.  Thanks Louis!

As I write here on December 13th, I have roughly 18 days left in 2016 to add more birds.  330 would be a great number to hit, but at this point, I will say that 325 was what I've been shooting for.  There's a lot of hardcore birding left, and there is a lot of potential for many more birds.  Stay tuned for more..