Having met two women new to birding at a recent Bird Walk at Boyce Thompson Arboretum, the three of us agreed to get together on occasion to do some birding.
Today was the day. I selected Granite Reef Rec Area along the Lower Salt River, a place with which they were unfamiliar, to see what we might find. Because I like to spend a lot of time when I’m at the river, I hadn’t birded there since early summer (too hot) and had no idea what we might find.
Kathleen, Beth and I began birding at 6 a.m. With no waterfowl immediately obvious on the river, we scanned above Red Mountain (not yet lit up by the sun) and found a small kettle of BLACK VULTUREs. They had seen lots of Turkey Vultures at Boyce Thompson but immediately confirmed the much shorter tail - the best ID mark we had from that distance. Their flatter wing position in flight was somewhat obvious although I've seen TUVUs sometimes rise up that way early in the day. Later, three of the BLACK VULTUREs would fly overhead so that they could then see the all black wing (instead of bi-colored of Turkey Vulture) plus the light primaries at the end of the wings.
 |
| Red Mountain [photo from my files] |
 |
| BLACK VULTURE [file photo] |
Kathleen commented on having heard a sound coming from the path off the parking lot. I hadn't heard it, but decided to check it out. What we found:
A small band of wild horses were working their way toward the picnic area, having bedded down, apparently, in the mesquite bosque. Two adults had foals following closely and nursing from time to time; the third adult may have been a stallion who waited for the four of them to emerge toward the picnic area. They were fearless, munching their way along, keeping an eye on us as we stood still at the gate. When they passed, we got on with birding!
Lucky me! My new birding friends liked adventure so we covered the west side quite thoroughly.
 |
| How many species do you see? |
We didn't want to spook the birds, but the WHITE-FACED IBIS were skittish and lifted into the air, circled a few times and then returned.
 |
| WHITE-FACED IBIS |
 |
| WHITE-FACED IBIS foraged in smaller groups when they returned |
 |
| SPOTTED SANDPIPER at same location |
The weedy areas had lots of sparrows but not the one I was looking to see! They were all LARK SPARROWS -- much more striking in appearance than a Clay-colored Sparrow!
 |
| LARK SPARROW [from my files] |
Approaching the dam, we had a mature BALD EAGLE fly downstream (west) and disappear off to the north. About the time we started focusing on the birds in the mud below us, another mature BALD EAGLE flew in from the south and followed the same flyway.
 |
| BALD EAGLE [file photo] |
In the mud, we had a great look at a male COMMON YELLOWTHROAT (yellow with black mask) and some SONG SPARROWs. A male MaxGILLIVRAY'S WARBLER was also in this general area. An OSPREY perched on the tallest pole on the barge by the dam while two COMMON GALLINULE (Moorhens) swam nearby.
We completed the complete circle of the west side of the picnic area before heading to the east-side trail where we added to our count of GREAT BLUE HERONs and spotted our only NEOTROPIC CORMORANT.
 |
| GREAT BLUE HERON twisting to preen |
 |
| NEOTROPIC CORMORANT looking like it's in serious molt |
The horses weren't our only mammal today. As Beth pointed out - Look! There's another cow coming out from the marsh to the river. Lots of cows over on the land reserved for Native Americans. (Salt River Pima Maricopa Indian Community)
Then we spotted an unknown bird - no, it was birds, plural: dark round moving balls of mud to our naked eye. Oh, wow! A covey of GAMBLE'S QUAIL drank at the edge of the river - until yet another cow emerged close by.
As any birder knows, although that was the end of our walk, we didn't stop birding until we were back in the car and out of there. (We don't stop then, either, but we don't count them for this location!)
So glad that Beth and Kathleen got me going and back to one of my favorite spots on the river!
* * *
View this checklist online at http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S39145402
No comments:
Post a Comment