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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

USA Grand Tour (1 Viewer)

well IOC just added Hen Harrier/Northern Harrier to it's proposed splits page.

Don't worry though, we will always have Gaviidae and Sterocoraciidae to start feuds over.

:)
 
Arriving in Jackson after a three hour drive through the snowy Idaho countryside, the most obvious birds were a number of Ospreys, several of which were occupying purpose-built nesting platforms. However my birding really took off at the Grand Teton National Park visitor centre.

Here a couple of Trumpeter Swans were much more interested in feeding in a small pond than in my presence less than 10 yards away. Other birds here included some very distant Sandhill Cranes, a noisy Red-winged Blackbird and a female Merlin being harassed by a Black-billed Magpie.

Here I met Andy Angstrom and Josh Kleyman who very kindly took me birding for a couple of hours that afternoon and the whole of the next morning. They showed my my first ever Cinnamon Teal, while a group of 80-odd duck on the eastern edge of the Jackson Elk Refuge included a handsome pair of Barrow’s Goldeneye, and good numbers of Green-winged Teal, American Wigeon and Gadwall. A couple of American Coot completed the set here and we headed off to Spring Gulch Canyon, in search of Great Grey Owls, which had been seen hunting in daylight just a couple of days earlier. We failed to score, and headed on to a couple of ponds managed by the Teton Science School, where twenty–odd Trumpeter Swans headed a fine cast of waterfowl, that included 3 Ruddy Ducks, a couple of dozen Goosander, and four Wood Duck. A Belted Kingfisher zipped across the pond and an Osprey drifted over.

We were back here again the next morning, and while the pond itself produced few surprises the highlight of the day was a magnificent Great Horned Owl perched on a telegraph pole. It was chased off by a Raven, but landed in a nearby tree, where a terrific duel ensued, with the clearly perturbed Raven dived repeatedly at the Owl which eventually launched itself at the Raven, turning completely upside down to fend off its perecutor with a full set of talons.

Back at the Elk Refuge six Long-billed Curlews were the first birds of the spring here, while what was presumably a first winter Northern (aka Great Grey) Shrike at the trout hatchery displayed a surprisingly thin mask. Some feeders up the hill from here held a Cassin’s Finch and the black-headed race of Dark-eyed Junco.

We spent the rest of the morning wandering around a huge area of snow-covered sagebrush looking for Sage Grouse, which sadly failed to show despite our searching and we had to be content with some very close views of four Red-tailed Hawks, a couple of Clark’s Nutcrackers, another riverside Townsend’s Solitaire and six Moose, including a couple feeding very close to the road. On the way back to town a a male American Kestrel and a fine male Northern (Hen) Harrier ghosted over the sagebrush. A final trip round the back of the Elk Reserve delivered a pair of Redhead and wonderfully close views of a group of Big Horn Sheep.

In the afternoon I was dropped again at the Trumpeter Swan Ponds - huge thanks to Josh and Andy. The only new birds here were a Northern Flicker perched high in an alder and a flight of three White Pelicans which circled once over the ponds before deciding that they were not to their liking, and drifted off northwards. Before leaving the ponds I also witnessed the most disgraceful display of gender inappropriate behaviour (AKA gross sexual rapacity) as a group of five or six male Goosanders pursued, mounted and almost drowned a hapless female. Spring was clearly in the air, as a pair of Barrow’s Goldeneye were also at it, albeit less violently. With the snow melting and filling the streams and ponds, a pair of female Hooded Mergansers appeared on the other side of the road on a pond where a couple of Beavers were collecting nesting material.

After this I took a long and winding walk back to town, seeing very few birds, except a couple of Mountain Bluebirds, a gang of five Black-billed Magpies, four American Goldfinches an immature Bald Eagle and a couple of Sharp-shinned Hawks.

Cheers
Mike
 

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Many thanks Larry - I especially like the fact that it is sitting on a bison turd - adds to the sense of place and a good conservation story to boot!


After the final session of my programme in St Louis I headed out for a swift couple of hours at Tower Grove Park – as recommended by Larry Lade – and what a great call that was! After agreeing a pick-up time with the cab driver to get back to the hotel in time for an airport transfer I headed for the Robert & Martha Gaddy Wild Bird Garden. In a park full of short-mown lawns and large trees this stretch of smaller trees and shrubs is a famous migrant magnet. My first steps along the path immediately delivered a violently beautiful male Hooded Warbler – flashing an intensely yellow face from the contrasting deep black hood and collar with all the outrageous magnificence that European and Asian birders lust hopelessly after while trying to persuade themselves that phylloscopus, cettia, accrocephalus and (especially) bradypterus warblers are much better for being drab, skulking and nightmarishly difficult to identify.

At the water fountain first a Hermit Thrush, then a Northern Parula and an overhead Yellow-rumped Warbler showed briefly, while a little further down the 100m pathway I found a Brown Thrasher, a bunch of White-crowned Sparrows and at least three more elegantly compact Hermit Thrushes.I spent a few minutes trying to persuade myself that one or all of them were Grey-cheeked. I was reluctantly conceding that sometimes, whatever you do to the contrary, the truth does sometimes insist on getting in the way of a good story when, to my delight, an unmistakably ginger-crowned Wood Thrush materialized on a low branch, giving me one of my target birds for the trip.

In the same ten-minute spell I also got barely sufficient views of my first Kentucky Warbler – sporting a black mask to offset its bright yellow face and underparts. An indistinct olive-brown ground scuttler eventually gave the briefest of views of its faintly barred undertail coverts without ever showing the boldly striped head that should make identifying Worm-eating Warbler relatively straightforward. I get a perverse satisfaction from the fact that they do not belong to the genus vermivora – which means “worm-eating”. Just round the corner the cone-needle litter of three dwarf pine trees held a Rufous-sided Towhee, a couple more Hermit Thrushes and an actual vermivora, and another personal favourite - Ovenbird. They have none of the attention-grabbing colour of some of the other warblers, but there is definitely something of the space cadet about the way they potter about, endearingly oblivious of anything going on around them. I so enjoyed this session that the White-eyed Vireo that was also seen (and which I still need) can happily wait for another day.

I then had a stressful hour getting back to the hotel as the taxi failed to show, the second one I called with a borrowed phone did the same, and the third got me back only just in time to catch the airport shuttle. However things could have been much worse – as my plane landed in Denver the pilot told us that a tornado had hit St Louis airport, causing moderate damage not long after we had taken off!

I wrote up on the connecting leg to San Francisco, where I’ll have another two weeks of holiday with my wife (which allows much less timing for write-ups). Assuming I haven’t missed any birds, the grand total so far (including four plastics) is a splendid 186 species. I’m especially happy with this as I’ve had to fit the birding around an intensive exchange programme involving up to 5 meetings a day.

Next stops: California!

Cheers
Mike
 
Mike, I have been waiting for your birding report while in the Saint Louis area. Too bad you only had a couple of hours at Tower Grove. If you could have stayed a little bit longer you would have had a much larger list of birds. I'm glad you were able to make your flight out west OK. I'm sure you will find a lot of interesting birds while in that area.

Good Birding!
 
Really interesting report with nice pictures.

Maybe You saw the next target from the plane ?
Alaska ?

There are not so high peaks like in the Himalayas, but compare the difference of valley altitude and top of the peaks.
E.g. the difference between base camp and peak of Mount McKinley is even higher than Mount Everest.
The also very high peak at the Ocean.
 
Many thanks Larry

As a brief cameo the park was terrific - and much easier to bird that Forest Park.

Hope you've been staying out of the way of the tornados - a scary business watching the weather programmes predicting where they would form and receiving the reports.

Cheers
Mike
 
What a trip, Mike! Keep the reports coming. I am getting rather jealous but looking forward i seeing what the Pacific coast has to offer.

Dylan
 
Here you go Dylan . ..

23 - 25 Apr: San Fransisco & Sonoma County
Before meeting Carrie off the morning flight from HK at San Francisco airport a two minute wander in the Clarion Airport hotel garden delivered a California Towhee and a pair of Wrentits fussing about a head height nest in a conifer. On leaving the hotel I discovered it was right on the edge of the bay and gazed longingly at the flocks of waders of different sizes which I could have checked out first thing if only I’d known how close it was.

After meeting Carrie we drove up to Santa Rosa in the Sonoma valley, about an hour north of San Francisco across the Golden Gate Bridge. Apart from Red-tailed Hawks and Turkey Vultures there were few birds to be seen from the highway, but as we pulled into my friends’ driveway a Black Phoebe flipped up onto the roof and as we walked inside I caught a glimpse of a Western Bluebird and a Western Scrub Jay on the garden fence. Other birds in the garden and surrounding trees included Acorn Woodpeckers, a pair of House Finches, California and Spotted Towhees and a singing Orange-crowned Warbler perched high in a bush. An afternoon visit to Jack London State Park for a family walk produced a single Hutton’s Vireo, an Oak Titmouse and several sunbathing Turkey Vultures.

On Easter Monday we combined a visit to the biodynamic (uber-organic) Benziger winery, where Golden-crowned Sparrow and the elegant Violet-green Swallow were new birds and a White-tailed Kite on the way back was strongly reminiscent of the closely related Black-shouldered Kite of Eurasia. The same afternoon Bodega Bay, some 40 minutes to the west was a wonderful treat. Under perfect blue skies I encountered my first Western and California Gulls, plus one I’d value some help with (see pic), and was blown away by the wonderful array of Pelagic Cormorants, Pigeon Guillemots, Great Northern Divers, Surf Scoters and Western Grebes floating very calmly and very close to the shore. On the shoreline were three or four Willet and my first Marbled Godwits and Black Oystercatchers. After the best Clam Chowder anywhere on the West Coast (just in case we don’t have enough arguments about nomenclature) a small pool at the mouth of the bay called Hole-in-the-Head attracted the first of a couple of coasting Northern Harrier and some more Wrentits, while brief looks offshore kept producing northward-migrating flocks of up to 80 Pacific Divers with the occasional Great Northern.



Cheers
Mike
 

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26-29 April: Yosemite
Next day we drove across to Yosemite National Park, passing the infamous Altamont Ridge where so many migrating raptors are killed by wind turbines, and picked up a single flyover Yellow-billed Magpie, which turned out to be the only one of the trip.

A walk around Groveland next morning began well with a half-dozen Cedar Waxwings sunbathing in a tree right outside the Charlotte Hotel and a wary walk in the woods behind (this is on the edge of bear country) produced one of my top targets the ridiculously-coiffed California Quail and a couple of Blue-grey Gnatcatchers and the dark-headed version of Dark-eyed Junco.

A stop at the viewpoint just beyond Buck Meadows yielded several handsome White-throated Swifts - swifts are way beyond my photographic capabilites but the fact that they have a colour scheme on the body that is reminiscent of Orcas should be enough of a reason to google them - and several Steller’s Jays.

As we reached the highest point in the road from the west gate to Yosemite Valley another brief stop amongst the snow-spattered conifers came up trumps as an outrageously yellow-headed Hermit Warbler emerged from a five or six Yellow-Rumped Warblers that responded to my pishing.

As late April is early in the season (and it has been a cold April) there was relatively little traffic in the main valley, and between the obligatory photo-stops among some of the most magnificent scenery in the world a number of birds showed well including a Golden Eagle, three American Dippers, Mountain Chickadee, a trio of White-headed Woodpeckers (which had the same call, white head and urgent rushing about as Black Bulbuls!), and a scavenging hordes of Brewer’s and Red-winged Blackbirds, Steller’s and Western Scrub Jays. Band-tailed Pigeon also showed briefly – zipping past the sublime Mirror Lakes at treetop height. Having moved hotels to be closer to the park a morning drive on the back trails amongst the scrub around the ABVI Inn at Buck Meadows started slowly, but eventually delivered singing Nashville Warblers,(despite trying I couldn’t string them into McGillivray’s Warblers) the duller Pacific version of Fox Sparrow , a dark-to-dazzling pink Anna’s Hummingbird, Black-headed Grosbeak and Buller’s Oriole, and a rather shy pair of Bushtits that eventually responded to my pishing.

Cheers
Mike
 

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Wow, you have seen so many birds already. It's been really interesting reading as I'm heading to the U.S in July and actually doing a road trip, so I'd be really happy if I saw even half of what you're seeing. Absolutely fantastic stuff.
 
Yes, well there are so many American birds you've seen now that I haven't! I confess I didn't even know about Yellow-billed Magpies... Sounds like you've had great success overall!

I like the waxwing picture - not their most recognizable features (crests, face markings) most visible, but instead their lovely yellow bellies and tail tips (which match the flowers) and of course sitting so closely, they reflect their communal nature.
 
many thanks Azzy and Gretchen - it was certainly a terrific trip. Just a couple more postings to come now, but still some very good birds and other wildlife.

To my frustration the Waxwings showed great skill in hiding their heads in the shadow of the tree trunk, but when the sunlight hit the dark head of Anna's Hummingbird (I've added a couple of pix), transforming it into a glittering purple mask I felt I was more than compensated!

Cheers
Mike
 
With much of the park still closed because of the snow there were several sites we could not visit, so after two days we got back on the road and headed by the back roads for Monterey, passing all too briefly through some great-looking oak savannah habitat. The top birds here were over 100 Western Kingbirds, a male and a female Phainopepla which I would love to have spent more time on, Western Meadowlark, and Swainson’s Hawk, all capped by three magnificent Lewis’ Woodpeckers, two of which I picked out hiding from the wind on the sheltered side of telegraph poles. The combination of the deep red face, broad grey collar and belly, with cherry-tinged flanks and British Racing Green wings makes for the oddest colour scheme of almost any bird I’ve seen – impressive though it is on a bird the size of a crow.

The drive was also notable for a huge dust storm (topsoil erosion) that cut visibility to a few yards, and meant I only got brief views of American Avocet, Gadwall, Osprey, Killdeer, Great and Snowy Egrets, American Goldfinch and a Forster’s Tern on a river high with snow-melt. A dam in the hills above Salinas held nothing but three Black-necked Grebes before we arrived in Monterey.

Monterey
The Knight’s Inn is one of many bog-standard motels on Munras Ave. It’s made considerably better by the pair of Violet-Green Swallows nesting in the roof above the check-in. Munras Ave also has a nice park, with numerous large pines running alongside it. Over the three days we were here it delivered a Chestnut-backed Chickadee,a flyover Red-shouldered Hawk, three Pygmy Nuthatches, a Bewick’s Wren and a cock Purple Finch with his prominently-superciliated consort.

It also produced the best inter-species interaction of the trip. A reddish-coloured squirrel sp. (with pointy ears and very fluffy tail - any clues to ID much appreciated) was being harassed by an Acorn Woodpecker, which for reasons unknown was upset by its presence. The squirrel stood its ground for a couple of passes from the woodpecker, but eventually lost its nerve, hopping off its branch and onto the trunk. At this sign of weakness three or four more Acorn Woodpeckers, which had clearly been lurking in wait, also joined in the assault, dive-bombing the unfortunate squirrel right down the trunk and away.

Following our windswept drive we took an evening walk along the shore close to the harbour. As with Bodega Bay a couple of Great Northern Divers, the odd Pigeon Guillemot and a flock of Western Grebes (this time including a Clark’s Grebe with a white face and brighter yellow bill) were permanently loafing in the harbour. One very big bonus bird with the flock a couple of days later was a glorious male Harlequin that was all but fully moulted into breeding plumage. It seemed very happy to hang about 30 yards offshore with the Western Grebes and only my camera running out of battery prevent some killer shots. The next morning a number of Brewer's Blackbirds - the dominant passerines here - had no such escape.

And as we walked west past Cannery Row and the Aquarium we found the first Southern Sea Otters loafing in the kelpbeds just offshore. Apparently these are not otters at all, but giant weasels that took to the water back in the dawn of time. Whatever they are, they certainly score extremely highly on the cute scale.

However, even they are no match for newborn Harbour Seals, which haul out to give birth just to the west right here on the Pacific Grove waterfront. The greatest number gather at a cove right by the Hopkins Marine Research Institute. There were about 100 animals on the beach, ranging from mostly white cubs some with wonderful gray leopard spotting across the face, to slightly older pups, most of them inkspot black and wriggling likes tadpoles as their mothers taught them to swim in the shallows. The best birds here were a pair of Black Oystercatchers, a couple of Wandering Tattlers and a trio of Black Turnstones and a Spotted Sandpiper, turning seaweed. Just offshore the NW wind provided a fine passage of Sooty Shearwaters, but precious little in the way of variety.


Cheers
Mike
 

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I'm no expert on mammals, and no books here, but would start by looking at Red Squirrel (relatively common in the west). I would think that he would be a big competitor with the Acorn Woodpeckers - imagine a guy like him getting into your acorn store! I don't know if this type of attack is frequent but I would think Acorn Woodies would not tolerate squirrels in general. I believe they are also one of the most communal woodpeckers, so the coordinated attack seems like it would be pretty normal. Must have been something to see! (You didn't see the tree where they store acorns each in its individual hole, I guess...)

Your seal pup is very cute too. Great mammal watching you got there!
 
Red Squirrel doesn't occur in California, so it's probably a Douglas' Squirrel, a close relative (which is sometime lumped with)

Sea Otters actually are otters, although really all otters could be thought of as big aquatic weasels
 
Many thanks for ID of the squirrel and clarification on the taxonomy of Sea Otters Mysticete.

The squirrel certainly looked pretty rusty, and yes the tree it was in was full of individual acorn holes Gretchen. I'd never seen collective harrying of a predator by any species of woodpecker before, so it was a real surprise - and raised Acorn Woodpeckers even higher in my estimation.

Plenty more mammals to come Gretchen . . .

Cheers
Mike
 
Thanks Mysticete for setting me straight on the squirrel - I've seen Reds in Dakotas/Wyoming I think, and saw something in northern CA which I assumed was the same. They seem to be the scoldiest of squirrels I've met, full of personality.

What I know about Acorn Woodpeckers is mostly from Attenborough's Life of Birds, but I find them the most interesting of an already very interesting family. I guess because they store their food so systematically and with such effort, they need at least several birds to defend what they've invested so much effort in. I haven't been bird watching in the West of the US, but am really looking forward to actually seeing Acorn Woodpeckers with their acorn storage tree. Also looking forward to one day seeing the Lewis' - as you noted a very unusually colored woodpecker.

Looking forward to the rest - birds and mammals!
 
On Saturday morning Carrie and I joined a tour with Monterey Bay Whale Watching http://www.montereybaywhalewatch.com/. I chose them because of all the commercial whale boats they stay out the longest (4-5 hours) and can travel the greatest distance in search of whales. (NB there were no birding pelagics planned for that weekend so it was whale boats or nothing). Even before we left the quay (actually even as we walked through the town and down to the pier) we heard the honking roars of the California Sealions and as the boat left the harbour we were shown how they swarmed aboard yachts, buoys and the breakwater to sunbathe and sleep. A female Southern Sea Otter and her cub also showed briefly. Western Gulls predominated in the harbour, while both Brandt’s and Pelagic Cormorants on the sea wall were in peak breeding plumage and a Black Turnstone gave the briefest of views as we cruised out into the open sea.

Although the wind had dropped overnight the bay was still choppy, and the Sooty Shearwaters, along with occasional Guillemots (Common Murre) and Pigeon Guillemots were still very much in evidence. Our first cetacean sighting was a group of tall-finned Risso’s Dolphins which never gave really close views, but our top target for the day was to follow up on a rumour that a Santa Cruz boat had seen an unusually early Blue Whale the day before. Slowing down for one more pod of Risso’s Dolphins we headed out to the edge of the Monterey Canyon, in a line with three other boats. Pretty soon our crew caught a distant spout and the chase was on. However this particular beast would dive for several minutes between spouts and after a tense 40 minutes, when it appeared behind us and further away, then in front, and then not at all, we left the short trip boats behind and headed further out towards another distant spout, also thought to be a Blue Whale . . . and hit the jackpot! Two BLUE WHALES and a small school of Pacific white-sided Dolphins were surfacing every five to ten minutes between feeding in a rather small area. Added to that another one was feeding about 500 metres away, and while group one was down we headed across to watch it come to the surface, and spout, three or four times in a minute or so before curving over and diving. Our final view (video posted at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLBYmUSLkTo) was of a 20-metre youngster surface, spout, show its head and whole body (which took a while) and finally its tail before disappearing again. Magnificent!

Jubilant, we headed back to Monterey, the standout bird being a Fork-tailed Storm Petrel, much bigger and pointier-winged than I expected, flying down the left hand side of the boat, and a flight of five Bonaparte's Gulls migrating north were surprisingly my first view of a bird I expected to be common throughout my trip, but nothing was going to hold a candle to these tremendous views off the world’s largest animal!

Cheers
Mike
 
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Next day we drove through Pacific Grove and round the coast (but not paying US$10 to go along the 17 Mile Drive through Pebble Beach) to Carmel (where Clint Eastwood used to be mayor) and according to the gen from the birder in Monterey there were supposed to be lots of Yellow-billed Magpies.

No Clint, no Magpies, but I did add some hoped-for waders: Western Sandpiper and Semipalmated Plover, plus three Dunlin looking very smart with the black bellies and bright chestnut wings of their summer plumage, were being harassed on the marsh behind the beach by dogs and children, and 3 Snowy Plovers on the beach itself were a subspecies tick.

The drive down to Big Sur produced a decent burger (the justifiably famous Ambrosia burger) and distant views of migrating flocks of Pacific Divers at Nepenthe, but sadly the skies were not darkened by flyover California Condors and the only other bird added was an Olive-sided Flycatcher at Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park, where a waterfall drops directly into the sea in a beautiful cove.

This place was made even more special by the passage of three Grey Whales, moving steadily northwards up the coast - it was fantastic to see two species of whales in just two days.

On the final morning of our stay in Monterey I went out to the northern shore beyond Pacific Grove for a final couple of hours birding. I did well again for waders, seeing Black Oystercatcher, Ruddy and Black Turnstone, Grey Plover, Wandering Tattler, Whimbrel, and best of all a trio of Surfbirds - one of my top targets for the whole trip. A Snowy Egret was also here, a Moorhen and a couple of Black-crowned Night Heron were on the golf course pond and a probable Orange-crowned Warbler was lurking in the big pine tree next to the public restroom.

Moss Landing

We broke the drive to San Francisco with a stop at Moss Landing Marina to look for the Sea Otter hangout. And having seen and enjoyed the sight of 30-odd animals floating along in an extremely laid-back pack I can't think of a better word (but please feel free to post if you do! - the nearest I can get are hammock, langour or loaf). Even when doing not much they are highly engaging - floating on their backs with their back feet sticking straight up out of the water and clasping their front paws together in prayer.

Even better is when they rotate, presumably to keep their bellies wet, but still keeping their front paws out of the water. This is hard to describe, and much easier to understand by watching the video (here). There was also another one, looking rather old and tatty, which was away from the rest of the group in the shallows, which didn't look like it had long for this world. Also on the beach here was a baby Harbour Seal expertly camouflaged among the rocks, and a noisy gang of Sealions resting on one of the jetties. There was also a wierd-looking squirrel which disappeared into holes in the ground which I had no idea about.

There were also a few birds - Sanderlings on the beach, a fly-past of a dozen Brown Pelicans, a pair of American Avocet, a dozen loafing Forster's Terns and the same number of Caspians Terns.

The next day we spent in San Francisco, mostly in Golden Gate and Praesidio Parks. While we had an enjoyable walk birds were few and far between, with the exception of a big flock of 200-odd Cedar Waxwings feeding on the flowering melaleucatrees near the running track and a pair of Wood Duck on one of the ponds.

And that was it for California. Next stop Chicago . . .

Cheers
Mike
 

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