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When: |
April 27th - 30th |
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Where: |
Southeastern Arizona |
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Attendees: |
Chuck H Brian Jones |
| Links: |
San Pedro National Conservation Area Southeastern Arizona Bird Observatory Hotspots
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I met my good friend from Tucson, Brian Jones, for a quick weekend trip through the Chiricahua Mountains. Me, Brian, his wife, and my friend Dave,
are doing
a 2+ week trip to Brazil in June. We wanted to have a get together for some
equipment testing before the big trip in six weeks.
For me personally, the goals of this trip were three-fold.
First: Brian and I have a lot of new equipment we have purchased for our Brazil
trip, so we really wanted to have a dry-run to see how everything is
going
to work. I wanted to make sure I could easily carry my new D-SLR, lenses,
binos, and hiking gear, etc.
Second: I really wanted to find an Elegant Trogon! Their range extends north
into just the southern part of AZ, right in the Chiricahua mountains. Cave
Creek
Canyon is famous for the trogon.
Third: I really needed a weekend to try and clear my head. Issues in my personal
life, from my Dad’s cancer coming back, ex friends being stupid, Fozzy’s
back problems, several things in my life seem to have been going really bad lately. These things have been weighing heavily on me and I needed to get to
some
remote places to center myself.
On to the trip details and pictures!
I arrived in Portal AZ late Thursday evening and then made my way to the nearby
Sunny
Flat Campground in Cave Creek Canyon. The weather was great
and the campground was about half full. Every site had a birder camped there. One couple I met from Canada had driven 3 days to spend a week in the
Chiricahuas.
Southeastern AZ is well-known to the birding world.
Brian arrived Friday before lunch and by then I already had quite the bird
list going. Just walking around the campground I got some great looks
at birds
I've not seen in years. Here are a few pictures I got that morning. The pictures
are clickable to a larger image.
My comfy home away from home!
MacGillivray's Warbler
Yellow-eyed Junco and a Bewick's wren
Pine siskins and a black-headed grosbeak
The area was made up of sycamores, oak, pines, junipers, Arizona cypress,
cottonwoods, and willows. Saw some deer near camp too.
On Friday, Brian and I moved camp up to Herb Martyr Campground, a little higher.
We hiked up the creek above the
camp until late in the day Friday. On Saturday morning we hiked up South Fork canyon, then went to John Hands Campground
because the trogon was sighted there. Never did see the trogon, but lots of other critters. Here are a few more pictures
from that morning.
A Mexican jay and some spiny lizards sunning on the rocks
We then headed over the Chiricahuas on Forest Road 42, which comes out on
the western side near the Chiricahua National Monument. It's known as the
land
of standing rocks, so named by the Chiricahua Apache Indians.
We left there later in the day and drove west an hour and a half to the San
Pedro River National Conservation Area. The San Pedro river is a vital
link for many migrant birds (as well as illegal immigrants!!) to work their way north through the desert. We camped in the BLM land east of the river and
hiked the conservation area Sunday morning. Had a comical encounter with some folks that thought we were from the MinuteMen group. Nope, sorry
not us! ;-)
Couple of more pictures from there.
A Vermilion Flycatcher, the prettiest bird in the southwest, IMHO. Also a
shot of a male summer tanager taking flight, another spectacular bird.
A Gila woodpecker, slightly out of focus and a Wilson's warbler.
A few shots of what I think is a song sparrow.
The Wilson's warblers were everywhere, we saw hundreds of them. The complete
birdlist for this trip is listed next. This list looks long, but really
it isn't even half of the birds in the area.
I'm looking forward to getting better with this camera and taking some more professional wildlife images. It's a matter of patience
and perseverance. I'm going to start hosting a page of just my wildlife photography when I get enough of a library going.
Overall Birdlist For the Trip
These are in the order I saw them.
Chiricahuas:
Yellow-rumped warbler
Pine siskin
Dark-eyed junco
Yellow-eyed junco (*This was a new lifer bird for me!) (**My friend Tiffany Shepherd emailed me and said I saw them with her in BIO-410 class, sorry, don't
remember, so it's still a lifer! :-p) (Having a bad memory is good for finding new life-list birds!)
Mourning dove
Spotted towhee
American robin
Acorn woodpecker
Wilson's warbler
Northern flicker
MacGillivray's warbler
Black-headed grosbeak
Painted redstart
Hermit thrush
Mexican jay
Green-tailed towhee
White-breasted nuthatch
House finch
Chipping sparrow
Turkey vulture
Scott's oriole
Bridled titmouse
Lazuli bunting
Lesser goldfinch
Blue-throated hummingbird (*Another lifer for me)
Bewick's wren
Ruby-crowned kinglet
Canyon wren (only heard this guy)
Swainson's thrush (I think, it may have been a Hermit)
Black-throated gray warbler
Hepatic tanager
Brown creeper
Plumbeous vireo
Cassin's vireo (maybe)
Townsend's warbler
Western tanager
Cooper's hawk
Black phoebe
Common raven
Lincoln's sparrow
Dusky-capped flycatcher
Poorwill of some kind, flew into camp and landed, but never called, too dark to see any plumages
San Pedro River National Conservation Area:
In addition to several of the same species above...
White-crowned sparrow
red-winged blackbird
Barn swallow
Great blue heron
Common yellowthroat
Song sparrow
Abert's towhee
Gila woodpecker
Summer tanager
Mallard
Gambel's quail
Vermillion flycatcher
Yellow-breasted chat (Only heard this bird)
Brown-headed cowbird
American kestrel
Lucy's warbler (*Another lifer for me)
Yellow warbler
Peregrine falcon
Lastly, several empidonax flycatchers I couldn't ID w/o help from someone more experienced.