Pining for Some Santa Rita Rarities

So maybe you've heard, but there is a nesting Pine Flycatcher at the Aliso Springs campground on the east side of the Santa Rita mountains. With this being both a first ABA record and a nesting record, it's kind of a big deal. For better or worse (probably for better), this bird happens to be nesting at the end of a remote 9-mile road that rife with steep climbs and descents, deep washes, loose rock, and various other perils. It is very do-able in a 4wd high-clearance vehicle, this is one chase that takes care as well as back up. At least there is no shortage of good birds along the away, including Botteri's Sparrows, Pyrrhuloxia, and Northern Pygmy-Owl.

I was fortunate to get in on a 5-person mission from Phoenix to chase the bird. We went split-skies on a rental rocked the kazbah down to Aliso Springs. After the drive the bird was easy (and also surrounded by a dozen other birders).

The PIFL looks more or less like other empids. Its lower mandible seems to show more yellow-orange while the body and tail gave an impression of being slightly longer and skinnier. The single note calls were recognizably different from other empids however, but even so, mad props to Dave Stejskal and the AZ bird police for getting excellent documentation and researching the ID.
PIFL was on many the informed birder's radar as a potential ABA 1st, but I must admit that for me it was not a bird I had heard of before. Unfortunately the preponderance of people precluded some of the really good and crushy photo-ops the early birds(ers) had a week before, but one is not entitled to very much complaining when hanging out with an ABA record, is one?

The Aliso Springs campground area was very nice with the springs running. While hoping for a close PIFL perch, we were also treated to Dusky-capped Flycatchers, Western Tanagers, and Blue Grosbeaks. It was another interesting instance in which the rarest bird, the chase bird, was both the most and least remarkable.

A Red-headed Woodpecker, a pretty rare and awesome bird for Arizona in its own right, was in another canyon nearby, definitely worth a detour on the way back out, especially to flush Montezuma Quail from the surrounding grassy hills.

From east to west, we cut through the Santa Ritas to Madera Canyon, whose Carrie Nation Trail had been hosting an Aztec Thrush up to two days prior to our arrival. Apparently the bird was flushed by some over-eager beavers and did not return, though to be fair this probably was not the first time it was flushed and it might have been on its way out anyway.
As the bird had not been re-found along the trail, I followed the creek up canyon where water pools might attract Thrush species. We picked up HETH and AMRO, but no Aztec.

The birding was solid and the herping was very good. Yarrow's Spiny Lizards abounded along the creek and we found a young Ridge-nosed Rattlesnake at trail's end by the old mine shaft. The Rattler was a lifer and 4th species of its kind I've seen in AZ.

A calling male Trogon towards the base of the trail was further consolation. A day when an Elegant Trogon is like the 3rd best bird is a very good day, even when dipping on AZTH (again). 

Miller Time: The Not So High Life...

Last year when I visited Miller Canyon in the Huachuca Mountains, it was an all-round fabulous trip. Alas, I dipped on the famous Spotted Owl, but came away with several new, closely photographed Hummingbird species, along with lots of the other southeastern AZ species.
A few weeks ago I swung by again, this time with more support both for the drive down and for some hard core birding throughout the day. My friend Tommy had tried for the Miller Canyon Owls before and dipped before too, in fact several times, but on this trip we were both feeling good about our prospects. Things started off well too, when he had some direct information from Tom Beatty Sr. of the Beatty Guest Ranch in Miller Canyon, on where the Spotted Owl had most recently been seen. After only ten minutes in the canyon, we even had a glimpse of an awe-inspiring Northern Goshawk making its way up the canyon--talk about a good omen!

Well, it actually was a bad omen. Maybe the Goshawk had the Owls keeping a low profile (good call there, Owls), but at any rate after several hours of frustrated searching, inclined hiking, and in my case one lovely half-turn spin pirouette backwards dive/fall into a ditch, we could produce no Owls, even amidst the sounds and sightings of many other great birds, including some firsts for the year like this Painted Redstart.

We heard the Goshawk calling off and on, though it too stayed elusive for the rest of our time, and had to contend ourselves with picking out Arizona Woodpeckers and House Wrens from the scrub oak and occasional pine. With many birds singing and less frequently seen, it was great exercise in audio birding, but otherwise there wasn't too much to show for our Miller Time, especially as the Goshawk was seen before there was any light for photography. I shall have to return once more.

While we were in the area, we briefly swung by Mary Jo Ballator's Ash Canyon B&B, just a few miles up the road from Miller Canyon. Her plentiful feeders often host a Lucifer hummingbird--one I still need for the ol' Life list--and are often a good spot to get local news on sightings and general bird goings on. We only tarried for a little while, and did not have the Lucifer's either, but did see some Coue's White-tailed Deer along the road.

Mexican Jays, one of the loudest and most abundant residents of the southeastern sky islands, were also predictably visible. While always fun to see, they were scant consolation.

We left the Huachucas and headed to Patagonia, where he had several hours of fantastic birding, too fantastic for me to mention here and still maintain the lugubrious nature of this post, so that all will be posted separately and later!
We ended the day in the lower reaches of Madera Canyon, first stopping by the Proctor Road turn off to look and listen for Northern Beardless-tyrannulet. We did succeed in the hearing portion, but failed in the seeing. We did see some other nice birds, including some handsome Black-throated Sparrows. We also heard what sounded like a cow giving birth to a small moon, but turned out to be merely a cow just sort of belching (no photos, out of respect).

Farther up Madera Canyon we spent the twilight hour by the Madera Kubo, adding Hepatic Tanager, Rufous-crowned Sparrow, and Yellow-eyed Junco to our list for the day. We also had some nice visuals and mediocre photos of Magnificent Hummingbirds, which we had seen and heard earlier in the Huachucas as well.

The Santa Rita mountains are fabulous birding and a visit there is never time poorly spent. Even our semi-bust of a trip to the Huachucas still had its highlights, and Patagonia gave us plenty as well. With the bookends to this recent trip down south now established, I can follow up with the substantial middle chunk of the day soon. Stay tuned!

It's Miller Time!

One of the most well known and well loved birding and hiking destinations in the Huachuca Mountains, Miller really is the champagne of Canyons. In addition to Sulphur-bellied Flycatchers and rare Tanagers, Miller's Canyon is one of the best places in Arizona, and perhaps North America, to see a Spotted Owl. Naturally I didn't see one, but along the way I did stop by the Beatty Ranch at the base of the upper canyon. The Beattys maintain a small bed and breakfast operation in the canyon and, best of all, a fully stocked Hummingbird station that draws in all kinds of southeast Arizona specialties.

The drive up to the Beatty Ranch is dry and dusty haul, but along the way you can expect to see Spotted Towhees, Mexican Jays, and Canyon Towhees all rustling about in the sparse undergrowth. Though their North American range is limited to the southern points of Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas, Mexican Jays are among the most sociable and vocal birds one might encounter in the sky island chain. This doesn't mean they're exceptionally fond of people, or at least of me, but through very careful and super scientific observation I discovered that these Jays like to eat nuts. This Jay was going mano-a-mano with a scrub-oak acorn.

The acorn proved to be a very stubborn adversary, and after a minute of squeezing and smashing, the Jay withdrew to a more private setting where he could eat in peace.

Perhaps his retreat was brought on by the annoying curiosity of this Canyon Towhee, a bird which the mellow blue Jays must regard as a stumpy and ugly neighbor. It occurred to me that Jays are, in many ways, like the stereotype New England WASPs. They're pretty on the outside and strain to keep their complicated social networks in order, but they can also be very snooty and cruel to anyone who doesn't meet their standards. The Canyon Towhee, by contrast, is less to look at, but I'm sure he leads a rich inner life...

This female Woodpecker, unlike the noisier Towhees and Jays, did not want to be seen at all. Tough luck! People say that if you want someone to look at you, you just have to stare at them and soon, for some supernatural reason, their gaze will gravitate towards you. That doesn't work with birds, probably because they have better things to do then sit around gawking all day. This realization, in turn, made me feel a little bit sad about myself...

Unless you're staying overnight at the Beatty lodge, you have to park before the complex and do a bit of walking to access the Hummingbird site and kick in a few bucks towards the sugar fund, but the jaunt is worth it. Over a half dozen feeders and cotton wads draw in the Hummingbirds while visitors sit on shaded bleachers and photograph, oogle, ogle, and let the mind be boggled by all the color.

Anna's Hummingbirds and Broad-tailed Hummingbirds are the most common species during the Arizona summer and they overrun Miller Canyon too. But if you're looking for a spot to consistently see some of the less common Arizona specialities, it's hard to beat Beatty's. So well maintained are the feeders that even Black-chinned Hummingbirds, the mostly mildly colored and mild-mannered of the bunch, have time to sit, drink, and show off their immaculate posture (I wish I stood up this straight after a binge of drinking).

Of all the migrant/summer Hummers whose North American range is exclusively in Arizona, the Broad-billed is perhaps the most common. These stunning birds are somewhere in between the Costa's, Black-chinned, and Broad-tailed Hummers, which are fairly common throughout the state, and the other rarer, more selective migrants that tend to stay in the southeast corner. The first time I saw one of these Hummingbirds I was stunned, and didn't imagine anything could be more shimmering. Amazingly, after twenty minutes at Beatty's you'll start to pass them over in favor of other, rarer birds--a true testament to the quality on display.



This immature Broad-billed still has some gorget to grow, but at least his pops, perhaps pictured above, has shown him where the best hangout is, the best place to pick up chicks.

All the same, this female Magnificent Humming is definitely out of the young Broad-bill's league. Not only is she Magnificent, she could totally crush him if he tried any funny business. At five-and-a-half inches, she's one of the larger Hummingbirds in the area, and it takes something extra special to get her attention.

Enter the Magnificent male...

It was a thrill to see this aptly named bird, but I'm pretty bummed with my inadequate photography. Cameras should come with a label on them that says something like, "Warning: This device will cease to operate properly if photographing wildlife that is above this camera's pay grade." Maybe it's just as well that the male Magnificent Hummingbird is a blurred bird; proper exposure of this hunk is known to cause paralysis in female Magnificent Hummingbirds and some humans.

Amazingly, the highlight hummer of the day was not the Magnificent. Lucifer, Berylline, and Plain-capped Starthroat could all be show-stoppers at the Beatty theatre, but they were not on stage that day. In a sense, this contemplative male Blue-throated Hummingbird wasn't either, but he brought a standing ovation out of me nonetheless.

I found this handsome fellow while striking-out on the Spotted Owls. An intriguing peeping sound drew my attention to a large Arizona sycamore where this clement critter was seeking some respite from the noontime sun. These large Hummingbirds have an appeal similar to the Black-chinned Hummers--a comparably conservative coloration with just the right accents. Hummingbirds are not known for their economy of style, but the Blue-throated pulls it off pretty well. Most of all, I was just glad to find a new bird--a new Hummer especially--that wasn't at a feeder. The feeders at Beatty's are terrific, but the one thing they don't provide is the full satisfaction of seeing a new bird out in the ruff.

I haven't birded Miller Canyon as much as I should, but even in my limited capacities it is a wonderful spot fully deserving of its sterling reputation. April through September; it's Miller time!