The Skylarking Sparrow
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Last year we neither saw nor heard a sparrow that should be common in the habitat in which we live — higher elevation grasslands with small shrubs, agaves and yuccas. Perhaps it was the lack of monsoon rains which were so infrequent that the grasses never did green up. Green grasslands seem to be a requirement for the secretive Cassin’s Sparrow (Aimophila cassinii). In fact, this species is thought to be nomadic moving to where the habitat is suitable during breeding season. It might be common one year and a no-show the next if conditions aren’t right.
As far as appearances are concerned, this is not a standout kind of bird. Rather, it is a very unremarkable looking sparrow that prefers to skulk in the grasses. I had to take this shot from quite a distance as the bird would drop down into the grasses if I got too close.
Cassin’s Sparrow (Aimophila cassinii)
When they find suitable habitat for setting up a territory, the males will fly up to visible perches and burst into a beautiful song hoping to attract a mate.
I’m Here, Where are You?
This usually occurs when the monsoon rains arrive and the grasslands green-up. The males then begin one of the most amazing mating displays of any sparrow — skylarking (flying up into the sky and fluttering down to a prominent perch) and singing all at the same time. Here’s a video that I took of a male Cassin’s Sparrow skylarking and singing from a perch on August 18.
Pretty cool, eh?
Published by Arlene Ripley on August 20th, 2010 Tagged Arizona, Birds, Cochise County, Nature | 1 Comment »Ash-throated Flycatchers
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They return around mid-April and I usually hear them before I see them. I say to myself “Oh good, the flycatchers have arrived. It’s about time.” The nest boxes, installed before we even moved into our house, are ready for their arrival and it isn’t too long before the Ash-throated Flycatchers (Myiarchus cinerascens) claim a box and set up their territories. Of our 8 boxes, five were used by the flycatchers and one by Cactus Wrens who, after their nest failed, proceeded to fill both of the kestrel boxes with nesting material. We don’t know if any of these attempts were successful but it must have been a lot of work filling those large boxes!
This one looks good!
Hauling In the Nesting Material
In…………
…………and Out
One day, during the peak of nesting, we had a tragedy when one of the flycatchers flew into a window. Since the sexes are alike, I didn’t know if the dead bird was a male or female. After all of the flycatchers had fledged, we found an abandoned nest with two eggs. It must have been the female from that nest that hit our window with tragic results. Upon examining the nest, we found it to be composed of a base of grasses and then completed with a thick layer of animal fur, probably from dead rabbits (I did see a bird picking the hair out of coyote scat one day!).
Nest Composition
Failed Nest With Eggs
Abandoned Eggs
All was certainly not bad news though — all of the other flycatcher nests were successes and as the nestlings grew we watched busy adults forage for insects.
Adult with Food
Fledge day comes early for Ash-throated young. While our Say’s Phoebes took their good time and finally left their cozy nest on our porch ledge at 22 days, the Ash-throateds fledged between 14 and 16 days. They can barely fly and land on the ground where they are most vulnerable to predators. Here’s a newly-fledged bird that I accidentally came across while walking through some grass. The parent birds have their work cut out for them trying to keep the young together and in a safe spot until they can care for themselves.
Newly Fledged Youngster
They arrive late and leave early. For a while it seemed that the Ash-throateds were everywhere and now they’re gone — on their way to their wintering grounds in Mexico and Central America. It will be a long eight months before we see them again.
Published by Arlene Ripley on August 14th, 2010 Tagged Arizona, Birds, Cochise County, Nature | 3 Comments »Rewind
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Since I’ve missed blogging for most of the summer, but still have a lot of things to write about, I thought I’d “rewind” a few months and take up where I left off for the next couple of posts.
A pair of Scaled Quail showed up with a whole gaggle of puffballs in mid-June, much earlier than last year. As we moved into July more quail parents appeared with their offspring so we now have many teenager quail visiting the feeding station each day. The new hatchlings are always the cutest and they dutifully follow their parents around for some weeks after hatching.
First Visit to the Feeding Station
Learning How to Find Food
Moulting into Adult Plumage
Nearly Grown
Unlike last year when we had Gambel’s Quail on a regular basis, we only saw an adult pair a few times this summer. We’ve never seen young Gambel’s Quail here but assume they are reproducing somewhere nearby.
Published by Arlene Ripley on August 6th, 2010 Tagged Arizona, Birds, Cochise County, Nature | 1 Comment »
Monsoon
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I’ve been away from this blog for too long but with good reason. A close family member has been ill for some months now and I haven’t felt much like blogging. It’s time to get back to the positive side of things.
The good news is: we have a real monsoon this year! July rainfall here at the house totaled 6.31″ which is amazing considering that our total yearly rainfall for 2009 was 6.96″!! So far this year we have received just under 12″ of rain. The surrounding hillsides and mountains are visibly greening up.
Dragoon Mountains enshrouded in clouds
Rainbows have been frequent and stunningly beautiful.
Rainbow over the Dragoons
The setting sun lights up the Dragoons in golden light.
Mountains of Gold
A Day in the Pinaleños
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The Pinaleños Mountains are located in Graham county which is just north of Cochise County. The 14th highest peak in Arizona, Mt. Graham (10,696 feet), is located in these mountains. Driving north on US 191, you take a left onto Swift Trail (AZ 366) just a few miles south of Safford. The road is paved to over 9000′ after which the pavement ends. There are plenty of stops to make on the way up this very scenic drive.
As we drove along US 191, we remembered the gorgeous wildflower display that greeted us on our drive to this area back in April. The roadside and center strip were ablaze with wildflowers. Now, the beautiful pink Parry’s Penstemon had gone to seed so we stopped to collect some seeds with the hope of achieving the same effect on our property. I’m sure it won’t look like this but one can dream.
Wildflowers along US 191 toward Safford, April 2010
Fortunately we had better weather on this trip than we had back in April when we got caught in some pretty heavy snow flurries while in the mountains. If you make a stop at Dankworth Pond (part of Roper Lake State Park) before going up the Swift Trail, you can get a great view of the mountains. Mt. Graham is somewhat hidden behind the clouds.
The Pinaleños from Dankworth Pond
US 366 (Swift Trail) starts out straight as an arrow as it passes through chaparral scrub. When you get to the oak-woodland the twists and turns begin as you make the 6000′ ascent.
View of the valley below from one of the lower pull-offs
By the time you arrive at Wet Canyon, a picnic and hiking area, you are in mixed conifer/deciduous riparian habitat. The stream was flowing nicely but the sound made it difficult to hear birdsong. I did enjoy the Red Satyrs, Echo Azures and Two-tailed Swallowtail butterflies that were around the area.
A Mountain Stream
Our next stop was to an area where I hoped to find Mountain Chickadees as I haven’t added chickadee to my Arizona birdlist yet. Unfortunately there were no chickadees about on this day but there was a huge compensation for that miss. Two Spotted Owls were roosting and preening nearby and I was able to carefully approach and photograph them while peeking out from behind the trunk of a large Douglas Fir. I left the owls just as I found them.
Spotted Owls (Strix occidentalis)
Because Spotted Owls need old growth forest (preferring Douglas fir), they are a species in jeopardy. The conflict is, of course, between humans and owls, logging or preservation of our pristine old-growth forests. I hope the owls come out on top but it doesn’t look promising.
Douglas Fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii)
The pavement ends just past Shannon Campground. We stopped for lunch here and as we sat at one of the picnic tables we enjoyed Magnificent and Black-chinned Hummingbirds, Yellow-eyed Juncos, Hairy Woodpecker, Hermit Thrush, American Robin, and a curious Cliff Chipmunk. As I walked around the campground I came across a small snake which turned out to be a Mexican Gartersnake, a protected species in Arizona. Unfortunately I had a telephoto lens on the camera and couldn’t get the whole snake in one photo.
Mexican Gartersnake (Thamnophis eques)
We drove the 11 miles of graded, dirt road as far as Riggs Lake (the road ends 3 miles past this spot). As we drove up the mountain, we saw lots of Red-faced Warblers, a few Olive and Grace’s Warblers, Pygmy Nuthatch, and other birds one would expect in the higher elevation Sky Islands.
Riggs Lake
On the way down, we made one last stop to photograph the scenic vistas and valley below. Those could be the Dragoon Mountains in the far distance.
Looking southeast
Published by Arlene Ripley on June 19th, 2010 Tagged Arizona, Birds, Hummingbirds, Nature, Reptiles, Wanderings | 2 Comments »
Okefenokee Swamp
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On our last full day in northeast Florida we decided to drive north into Georgia to another of our favorite spots — Okefenokee Swamp. On the way, we passed through the Osceola Wildlife Management Area where the pine flatwood forest has been managed to preserve habitat for the federally endangered Red-cockaded Woodpecker (Picoides borealis). Red-cockaded Woodpeckers require a clear understory and fire suppression practices in modern times have caused serious loss of habitat. The trees with nesting holes were marked with white rings around the trunks and, happily, we noticed several dozen marked trees as we drove around the area. Unfortunately we had only the briefest glimpse of one flying woodpecker that day.
Osceola WMA, Red-cockaded Woodpecker nest tree
To protect their nests, the woodpeckers drill holes all around the opening to cause the pine to ooze sap which deters predators from reaching the nest cavity. Active nest holes have lots of sap around them.
Active Red-cockaded Woodpecker nest tree
We entered Okefenokee Swamp on the west side at Stephen C. Foster State Park.
Arriving around mid-afternoon we found that the only real access to the swamp was to rent a kayak, canoe or small engine-powered boat. We opted for the boat since we had only a few hours ahead of us to explore the swamp. I’d not recommend this means of transportation if you have more time. Peace and solitude are the essence of the swamp and this is lost with a noisy gas engine, especially the one we got that killed about two dozen times! But, it did get us to some of the scenic backwater areas of the scenic swamp.
Exploring Okefenokee by boat
As we cruised through waterways bordered by majestic Bald Cypress adorned with Spanish Moss (not really a moss but a member of the Pineapple Family), we enjoyed the warbler of the cypress swamp — the Prothonotary Warbler. Their song accompanied us wherever we went.
Prothonotary Warbler (Prothonotaria citrea)
Another treat was looking up to a sky filled with ten Swallow-tailed Kites.
Swallow-tailed Kites (Elanoides forficatus)
Our Florida trip was a short but memorable one and we always look forward to returning to an area where birding and natural history is at its finest.
Published by Arlene Ripley on June 6th, 2010 Tagged Birds, Nature, Plants, Wanderings | 1 Comment »Florida’s Northeast Coast
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I knew the rest of my birding in Florida would not equal the wading bird rookery in St. Augustine but there are some nice coastal beaches that are not to be missed when in this part of the state so I headed over to Ft. George Island with a short stop at Kingsley Plantation. Soon after I arrived a whole school bus of soon-to-be graduating seniors disembarked and you could tell the kids were already in vacation mode. I decided to press on but while driving out, I stopped when I heard the trill of the Northern Parula — a bird that had been so familiar to me when we lived on the East Coast. As I stopped the car I caught of glimpse of something large flying through the vegetation and saw that a Barred Owl had landed just opposite the car.
Barred Owl (Strix varia)
My next stop was Huguenot Memorial Park, the name of which doesn’t sound like a beach area at all but it is. In fact, it’s one of those beaches that you can drive on with sand that is well packed down. I was hesitant about driving a rental car on to the beach but when I saw how many cars were already out there, it seemed safe enough. The best time to visit here is winter when the beach is well-populated with over-wintering gulls, terns, shorebirds and waders. There was but a small remnant left except for abundant numbers of Laughing Gulls, much spiffier looking in their breeding plumage than they are in winter. Here and there were a few Black-bellied Plovers and Ruddy Turnstones.
Ruddy Turnstone (Arenaria interpres)
Things picked up when I found the resting flock of Black Skimmers, one of my favorite seabirds.
Black Skimmer (Rynchops niger)
There they were, a flock of about 25 skimmers minding their own business when a Laughing Gull (Leucophaeus atricilla) ambled over looking to make trouble. For no obvious reason, the gull approached one of the resting skimmers and grabbed on to its wing feathers and began tugging which resulted in the skimmer protesting loudly.
Ouch! Let Go!
I was expecting the loss of a feather or two but the gull tired of the tug-of-war game and both birds settled back down as if nothing had happened.
In amongst the many gulls were a few breeding-plumaged Royal Terns.
Royal Terns (Thalasseus maximus)
Before long, the pair began to vocalize loudly, the male mounted the female and it appeared that little terns would soon be on the way.
Next stop: Okefenokee Swamp, Georgia
Published by Arlene Ripley on June 5th, 2010 Tagged Birds, Nature, Wanderings | 1 Comment »
