Keeping it Local

It has been unusually nice in Phoenix these last several days. People are kinder and more cordial. The dogs bark less; the cats purr more. The raging cold fronts that are turning up Blue-footed Boobies all over California haven't been quite so generous farther inland, but they have at least dropped the temperature in the valley about ten or fifteen degrees lower than expected. 

Birds, beasts, beetles, and birders alike have been loving it, even if the end-of-summer rarities are starting to drop off now.

This past weekend I did some local birding in the valley, getting some photos of the usual suspects in early mornin' light and loving the lack of 7am perspiration.

The late August/early September time frame brings lots of great chases. Errant pelagic birds, wayward warblers, and peregrinating passerines pull birders with the requisite time and gas money to all the corners of their states. In the southwestern U.S., this also often demands an endurance of the states' most unpleasant weather.
After participating during that high-paced, high intensity interval, it was very nice to tour around some of the regular spots and reacquaint with the Sonoran staples. The Greater Roadrunner and the Cactus Wren, luckily, are not jealous birds. They will still be visible and vociferous when one comes back from the Santa Ritas or from Lake Havasu, and just want a nice birding jaunt around the park.

Gnatcatchers are not jealous either. In fact, they're one of the more oblivious species around town, which is perhaps in part why they dress so very indistinguishably. Find a clump of creosote bushes and you will find a clump of Gnatcatchers, probably with a few Black-throated Sparrows too.

Inca Doves are pretty accommodating as well, even grandmotherly. However, they tend to be more suspicious around the nest (who isn't?). What exactly is going on here?

"None of your business..."

Gila Woodpeckers are the great housing contractors of the American southwest. Though they sometimes nest in mesquite and palo verde trees, just about all of the holes one observes in saguaro cacti are Gila handiwork. All the Elf Owls, Starlings, Lovebirds, House Sparrows, Screech Owls, Jones, Smiths, Rabinowitzes, and Johnsons of the neighborhood have Gila Woodpeckers to thank for their domiciles.



Much like an angsty Kingfisher, September has flown by pretty quickly. A few more weeks and it'll be time to start scanning the big lakes for Gulls. Before that next great stage of annual chasing takes off, I'll be enjoying the Phoenix locals for a little while.
I don't even remember the last time I stopped and photographed a Lesser Goldfinch--I think it's been close to two years. On any given Saturday, they're out and about when I leave, and they'll be there when I return. Thanks Lesser Goldfinch, you're Greater in my book.

Where there is a Nemesis, there must also be a Hero

When flocks of bird nerds get together, they fill the air with stories and tails, discussions of past sightings, future sightings, ornithological taxonomical distinctions and splits, migrations, and all manner of other things that involve the esoteric jargon that comes with any serious past time. One of the more common idioms, one with which even the most casual or greenhorn birders are familiar, is the dreaded "Nemesis Bird." Some of the best birding stories, even the best birding blogs, have to do with the big misses relating to a Nemesis Bird, a bird one has repeatedly tried and failed to see. In many cases birders have multiple Nemesis Birds, and they may spend many years and dollars trying to find them. The Nemesis Bird weighs heavily on a birder's mind, influencing trips and confidence, determining whether or not one has a successful outing even quite apart from any other birds that are seen.

Of course, every good story needs some sort of adversary, some sort of challenge, and the Nemesis Bird, as a concept, holds a high place in the birding lexicon and identity. Inversely, I want to posit that there is another bird, the protagonist, who may often be under-appreciated, who is less often mentioned in the stories or put on the pedestal.
Enter the Hero Bird, the stoic, tragic characters(s) in many birders' lives, who saves one birding outing after another and may never get the full credit it is due--certainly none of the attention and hype that Nemesis Bird receives.

The Hero Bird is more difficult to define. It's the bird that makes the trip when the lifers or nemeses don't show. It's not so common that it's boring or blasé, but it's still a reliable and delightful find when it judiciously reveals itself. Deciding on one's Hero Bird is tricky, because the rarity if the birds must be taken into consideration as well as the other circumstances and frequency of the sightings.

For example, Cardinals are always a pleasure to see, but I doubt many people would identify a Cardinal as their Hero Bird because in most locales where they're seen, they're so common that they don't serve as a singular, standout sighting. The Hero Bird must allow great looks, better perhaps than one might expect, or better than one has heard of other birders having. The Hero Bird makes an otherwise mediocre trip, one without lifers or super sightings, into a fulfilling adventure. The Hero Bird is not necessarily rare, nor necessarily common, but it feels like a blessing every time it's seen. Like a comic book superhero, the Hero Bird doesn't appear all the time and save the day, but it shows up often enough, or in the most desperate of circumstances.

Trying to think of my own Hero Birds, at first I speculated it may be the Le Conte's Thrasher. This is an uncommon bird, one not widely distributed, and I've been able to find it every time I've tried, including several trips with out-of-state birders who've gotten in touch specifically to find that bird.
It's not a guaranteed sighting and it's a local specialty, but I've always had luck with the Le Conte's. However, I've never seen this Thrasher anywhere but in the little Thrasher spot out in Buckeye. While it's a reliable sighting, it will never show up to save the day, or at least it never has, when I've been birding elsewhere in Arizona. Le Conte's Thrasher, you are a great bird, but you are not my Hero.

As I thought about it more, I realized that I probably don't have the greatest Hero Birds, in part because I'm not a great birder and haven't gone on lots of great birding trips. Then, on further meditation, I realized that my two probably Hero Birds are indeed great. Bird names never lie or mislead, after all.
My two Hero Birds are the Great Horned Owl, and the Greater Roadrunner.

These birds are big and badass, but that alone doesn't seal the deal. Neither the Greater Roadrunner nor the Great Horned Owl are rarities, but I don't see them every time I go birding either--it's vitally important that a Hero Bird isn't overly available, or else all the mystique is lost. But when I see them, I tend to get very close up views and good photos.
I walked under this Great Horned Owl after spending hours trying to turn up a rare reported sparrow at the DBG. I had no luck with the rare bird, nor did anyone else I talked too, but the Great Horned made the trip absolutely worth it. This isn't the only time a GHO has shown up and saved a failed chase. Owls already have a lot going for them, and a visual always has a big impact. I'd venture that many people could find the Great Horned to be one of their Hero Birds. They combine awe and availability almost perfectly.



The Greater Roadrunner also happens to be one of my favorite birds. I feel satisfied with my photo collection of it, and have had some amazingly crushing views, including when a Roadrunner ran across my feet on a trail in east Phoenix, and also massacred a Mourning Dove chick mere feet away at the DBG (pictured below). Roadrunners aren't regarded as particularly skittish, but many is the birder I've spoken too who bemoans their lack of good, prolonged Roadrunner sightings. I've got 99 bird problems, but quality time with the Greater Roadrunner ain't one of them.

So, do you have a Hero Bird. What bird has given you almost undue, face-melting looks, on multiple occasions? What bird has shown up, time and again, when it seemed the morning was  over, the afternoon doldrums were setting in, and the birding trip was a bust?

For many birders, finding and conquering our Nemeses Birds are some of the most defining and memorable moments. Let us also recognize the Heroes.

Roadrunnin'

In the famous old cartoon, an incompetent and startlingly emaciated Wile E. Coyote tests his destructibility while in pursuit of the quick and clever Roadrunner. While the Coyote casts a menacing, if ultimately harmless figure, the Roadrunner is a gentle, aloof creature who wants nothing more than to run fast and eat seeds along a saguaro-speckled highway.

Those cartoons were silly fun. Like many people, I even felt that after a while the Coyote really deserved to catch the Roadrunner. But thinkin on it now, it seems like in all the craziness of that show, the Roadrunner's characterization as gentle is perhaps the most unbelievable aspect.

I love Roadrunners. They're big, beautiful, iconic desert birds, and it's truly jaw-dropping every time I see them out and about, even though they're fairly common. They've got cool looking feet and are perhaps the only birds that come with built-in racing stripes! That being said, the Roadrunners I've observed around Arizona are themselves much more ruthless and determined predators than our scraggly coyotes.

Roadrunners are successful predators because they're not too picky. As any bird book will mention, they eat bugs, small reptiles, rodents, birds, and even fruit if they must. Normally I wouldn't think of a bird from the cuckoo family as a vicious killer, nor even a meat-eater for that matter. Now, imagining a Roadrunner eating bugs of lizards seems appropriate, even familiar. I've had the pleasure of observing exactly this sort of feeding behavior from time to time.

Here a male Roadrunner--identified as a male by the blue and orange in his eye stripe--proudly poses with his cold-blooded kill.

I associate certain bird groups as eating certain things. I read that familiar caption, "eats small rodents, birds..." and usually don't think much of it. For the longest time, it almost struck me as a sort of disclaimer, just in case one crazy Roadrunner breaks free from the bug & lizard racket to go after a mouse. I guess I never really believed it because I had never seen it. Hawks, Falcons, Owls...those are the birds that eat other birds, that eat mammals. They've got talons and hooked beaks; they're built for it. Lots of birds eat bugs, and plenty will go for reptiles if given the chance. Without any experience to the contrary, I had just lumped Roadrunners in that group as well.  Recently I was confronted with the blunt, graphic reality that Roadrunners really are thoroughly predacious birds, that they do catch warm blooded creatures, and that they'll tear them apart.

This Roadrunner, a stout beast-of-a-bird pushing twenty-four inches in length, caught what I believe to be a young House Finch along a perimeter fence at the Desert Botanical Gardens. It carried its quarry to a little sunny patch of dried palo verde needles, and then began to disassemble its meal.

The Roadrunner has neither gripping talons nor an exceptionally strong sharp beak. While pressing his long tail against the fence to sturdy himself, he thrashed his prey back and forth, back and forth, working the edibles loose until he could swallow them in manageable chunks.

Raptors can catch, kill, and eat their warm-blooded prey with efficiency and precision. Raptors are really good at what they do. While the Roadrunner is usually a graceful, dexterous creature, here it resorted to blunt force, to wild motion, as it tasted blood. He was determined, but unlike the raptors, seemed out of his element.

Roadrunner Rex was very focused on his grisly task and paid me little heed, even as I struggled to fit both the Roadrunner and the Finch into the frame. The feast was up close and and personal, shocking and transfixing to observe...

I don't really know how to explain it. There was just something so disordered about this scene, and not just because of the guts and gore. Looking at a Roadrunner's cool and unique anatomy, even knowing the expert analysis, it just doesn't seem like this kind of graduated predator...and yet here was the proof, staring me red in the face.

This is more the image I'm used to seeing: a composed, colorful bird with a keen eye for the next little meal that might scuttle across its path.

But there is another side to the Greater Roadrunner. This side is seldom seen, though not because of shyness. It's not the side of the Roadrunner that we see in Saturday morning cartoons or even in many quintessential Roadrunner photos.

I guess it's the same harsh realization we come to with many other wild animals. Just when we think they're tame, they rebel. Just when we think the Roadrunner will zig, it zags. In the end, I know no more about this intriguing bird or how to predict its behavior than Wile E. Coyote.

Greater Roadrunner

There is no Lesser Roadrunner that I am aware of, but nonetheless this emblematic bird of the American southwest is pretty great. At almost 2 feet long, these zygodactylic (two toes front, two toes back) cuckoos (family cuculidae) are one of the more interesting ground specialists in North America. With its shaggy crest, long tail, and predatory nature, these birds do establish a certain harkening back to the dinosaurs.They also have bits of iridescent blue throughout their tail, head, and face, which makes them more than just an oddity to see, and the males sport an excellent, flame-like streak back from their eyes that moves from blue to orange.
I was very lucky to get some great shots of this Roadrunner at the Desert Botanical Garden in Arizona. A good birding trip really needs one of those power moments, when a cool bird is identified or photographed and done with extreme thoroughness and satisfaction. That was very much the case for me with this fine specimen. Be sure to click on the pictures for a larger image.

He first strolled rather lazily by while I was actually staking out my nemesis, the Wilson's Warbler

He then proceeded into the brush without too much urgency

He then emerged a few minutes later with, one might say, a cold-blooded kill.

After he had showcased his catch, he left again, exactly the same way he went before.

(08/2011) We had a couple run-ins with the Roadrunner, and have as of yet been unable to get a really satisfactory photo, but these few get the idea across.

This specimen did not have as dark or pronounced a crest as other roadrunners I've seen, nor did it have the nifty blue and orange eye-stripe, which leads me to believe it was either adolescent or a female, or both.