Nine life-birds

It doesn't get much better than this. We expected to find some new life-birds on our trip to southcentral New Mexico, but 9 in one day? We travelled south about 1 1/2 hours from our motel in Socorro to the Perga Dam region. Our first stop was at Animas Creek Road, a small one lane road through scrub desert and an irrigated nursery. One life bird after another made an appearance starting with the cardinal-like Pyrrhuloxia and quickly followed by the "clownfaced" Acorn woodpecker. Say's phoebe, Brewer's sparrow, the White-winged dove (new for our North American list), Brewer's blackbird all made an appearance along this species-rich stretch of blacktop. Later at the Perga and Elephant butte dam areas, we added the Western and Clark's grebes and the Lesser goldfinch. Nine in one day! Definitely worth the time and effort to get to the "Land of Enchantment".

New Mexico - Day 2

Day 2 of our New Mexico birding trip finds us in the south-central part of the state at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. Snow geese, Ross's geese, and Sandhill cranes arrive here in the thousands during late September and will winter here until they return north in early spring. The numbers of geese and cranes are almost too much to comprehend as the sights and sounds of their movements throughout the refuge are a constant stimulation to our senses. We spent the morning learning about some of the behaviors of the cranes which made the morning's observations all the more impressive. Bowing, crouching, and tail wagging are all warnings to other cranes not to invade another's space. If the warning goes unheeded, then the intruder is chased off with kicks and bites from the parent cranes. Birds are not the only inhabitant of the refuge as we quickly found out. A lone coyote, apparently indifferent to our presence, trotted up and over an imbankment and passed withing 25 yards of our birding troupe. Obviously, he had something more important than us on his mind. The evening hours were no less spectacular as we watched hundreds of cranes fly into the relative safety of a shallow pond near the refuge entrance. Tomorrow, we'll head further south for new habitat and new species .

We're off on a great birding trip to south-central New Mexico. Our guides are the experienced and well respected Don Freiday and Pete Bacinski from New Jersey Audubon. Sharon and I are hoping to amass a good number of life-birds on this trip as it is our first venture into New Mexico. Day 1 found us beginning outside Albuquerque at Tres Pistoles Canyon. Almost immediately, we began checking off new species. Curve-billed thrashers, Western bluebirds, and a Townsend's solitaire were all in great view. From here, we ventured up into the Sandia Mountains and Sandia Crest, an elevation of over 10,000 feet. Our target birds were the Rosy-finches, but a crowd on the decks near the feeders spoiled our chances at these birds. A nearby flyover of a Sharp-shinned hawk and nice close views of two more life-birds, the Mountain chickadee and the Steller's Jay, were more than ample compensation for the missed finches. We plan to return to the mountain later in the trip and perhaps our luck will be able to photographed the finches at that time. We ended the day with a trip to the Rio Grande Nature Center and had great views of wood ducks, ruddies, common and hooded mergs, and more. After a successful day like this, what more could we ask for? Now it's off to Socorro and an early visit to Basque del Apache tomorrow.

Back to the Bent

I have posted reports from one of our favorite birding locales, Bent of the River in South Britain, CT, several times before. The great thing about the Bent is that there is something new every time we go. A number of feeders right outside the observation deck at the Audubon Center affords us the opportunity to get nice and close to our subjects, and as they busy themselves taking advantage of the smorgasbord provided by the kind people at Audubon, they pay us little mind. Hence, photographs rank on the readily available end of the scale. Today's treat was several Fox sparrows foraging on the ground below one of the nearby feeders. These rufous beauties were a bit difficult to get off a clear shot of at first as they were concentrating their efforts below some thick brush. Patience paid off as it usually does, however, and one of the birds moved up into the open and gave us nice looks and nice shots. Special thanks to Audubon educator Jim Drennan who helped us identify the bird and stayed on to offer more advice for quite a while. Just one more reason to make this one of our premier "photo-op stops."

The North country

We're finishing our 2 week tour of northern New York, affectionately known to we New Yorkers as the "North country". The Adirondacks experience a climate in which the onset of winter generally occurs around Thanksgiving and lasts through April. This year, we got a head start with 10 inches of snow falling over the Lake Placid area on October 29th! While inconvenient as far as travel goes, we were already at our destination in Higley Flow on the Raquette River, and the new fallen snow made for a photographers paradise. The day after the heaviest snowfall, we were blessed with crystal clear deep azure skies and brilliant sun. The perfect winter wonderland day and it was not yet Halloween! Birds which had been scarce at the feeders were suddenly more than anxious to convene for an easy meal. The landscape made for photo ops which you just couldn't fail with. By the end of the week, warmer temperatures had all but erased this spectacular canvas. But the images are recorded by the digital camera for posterity and for me to share with you.