Update and return from blogging hiatus

To all of my faithful followers, SORRY!!! I haven't posted in over a month.  Each time I went to do a post, I would get distracted by something. It's been an insane summer. 

I won't go into all the details just yet (save those for a dreary winter day :D ) but I will fill in on some of the stuff that has happened. 

As usual, for most of the summer, I've been chasing rare birds around southeast Arizona. Some of the birds that have turned up since my last post have been: Plain-capped Starthroat (as pictured on my blog header), Aztec Thrush, Brown-backed Solitaire (a potential first ABA record), a Green Kingfisher at San Pedro (which has repeatedly refused to appear for me), 2 Black-bellied Plovers at Wilcox (Found by me), another Aztec Thrush in the Chiricahuas (again, found by me) and several other awesome birds. 

A Wood Stork has been hanging around in Phoenix over the past week (I'm not chasing it) and a Blue-footed Booby turned up on a lake just east of Albuquerque, NM (might chase it). 

Other than that, it's been absolutely crazy.  I've been kept pretty busy. 

Oh! I wanted to tell you the most fun part of the whole summer! I got to help out with Camp Chiricahua! 

Some of you might remember me mentioning this last year when I attended Camp C. 

This year, I actually got to hang out with the group.  

It was a younger group of kids this year, but a very awesome and highly interested group. 

You could show them a bird 3 or 4 times and they would still look at it. You could show them plants, and they would look (Dave was very happy about this). 

Anyway, it was one of the most awesome groups I've ever hung out with. This year, instead of the usual one person not interested, it was the opposite. Everyone was interested and everyone was a good birder! Not like some groups you get where one person isn't a birder at all (Dave was pretty happy about this too. :D ) 

This year's camp counselor (Rebekah Rylander from Austin, TX) was awesome and did her job well (keeping the kids out of trouble.... lol ). Definitely a good person for the job and more creative than most. She gets high marks from me. ;) 

Camp C this year was highly successful (we even got to camp at Rustler Park this year. Got rained out last year.) The high point of the camp for almost all of the kids (I, unfortunately couldn't join them that day) was the finding and documenting of the ABA's potential first record of a Brown-backed Solitaire.  I heard from them a couple hours later and then drove over to join them that evening. They were ecstatic (It was the first time any Camp Chiricahua group had found a first ABA area record). Dave seemed to be almost more ecstatic than they were! :D 

As you can imagine, I wasn't very happy. ;)  But I did take them to Patagonia to see the Sinaloa Wren and then on to Florida Canyon to see the Black-capped Gnatcatchers. 

After dropping them off in Tucson, I headed back to Sierra Vista the next morning and headed up Ramsey Canyon. Fortunately for me, my luck held and I did not even have to wait. The bird sang as I walked up the canyon. 5 minutes later, I was looking at the ABA's first potential record (well, first to potentially be accepted anyway) Brown-backed Solitaire. 

Fortunately for everyone, the bird stuck around for a few weeks which gave me time to go back and photograph it. 

Unfortunately for the campers, an Aztec Thrush was found in Ramsey Canyon a few weeks later. I had the good fortune to be able to go see and photograph that bird as well. 

A couple weeks later, a Plain-capped Starthroat showed up in Patagonia at the Spirit Tree Inn. 

I had just happened to be in Sierra Vista when the bird was reported so I was able to be there the next morning. Again, my stroke of good luck held. The bird came in every 30 minutes (hence the photo on my blog header)  Unfortunately for others, that was the only day it did. 

Other than that, it's been rather quiet recently. 

Onward to upcoming news! 

I am driving to Tucson tomorrow, getting some stuff checked out on my car, and then I am driving to Monterey, California on Friday!! 

I'll be doing it in stages. I'll drive to L.A., spend some time puttering around there, then drive north along the coast to Monterey where I will be catching the Aug 31st Pelagic trip with Debi Shearwater!! You can tell I'm excited. :D 

It will be my first Pelagic trip ever so I'm expecting lots of lifers.  I'm buying another CF card so that I can take lots of pictures.  I'll need it. I expect that the first 200 or so photos will be blurry. I'll need a few hours of practice to get sharp photos from a moving boat. 

Anyway, I'll give a full report about that when I get a chance.  

I will be back in Arizona on the 4th of Sept. I'm picking up Dave Jasper from the Airport on the 5th and will be back in Portal that night. I will be in Portal on the 6th (packing mostly) and then starting the long drive home on the 7th.  I will be home by the 15th. Just in time to leave for Duluth on the 16th.  I'll be home for good by the 21st. 

Sorry for the lack of photos in this post. I felt bad, so, same as the last post, here's my Flickr url: http://www.flickr.com/photos/swallowtailphoto/

Happy Birding!! 

Update

Sorry! I haven't posted in over 2 weeks! I've been swamped.  Here's a summary of what's happened since I posted last: 

Jacob Cooper and I drove up to his house in CO for a relaxing 3 days. I drove up to Jacob Lake (west of Marble Canyon) and met him there. While I was there, we managed to do Sunset and then sunrise at the north rim of the Grand Canyon. That was pretty awesome! We hopped in his truck and headed north. Our first stop was Zion National Park where we picked up California Condor! 

Then we drove up to Grand Juntion, arriving late at night.  The next day, we slept in late, Jacob's mom made a full breakfast for us and we hung around the house most of the day which his mom did laundry, Jacob got some stuff done, ect. That night, we went to see the new Transformers movie.  The next day, we did pretty much the same thing except go to look for Gunnison Sage-grouse. We failed, but I did find my first Brewer's Sparrow in a loooong time. It was a good year bird. On our drive back home, we stopped in Ouray, CO where we picked up Cassin's Finch, Black Swift and Western Grebe. I also got my year Barrow's Goldeneye. 

We arrived back at the Grand Canyon where I spent the night. Then I drove back home the next morning. 

When I hit Tucson, I picked up my friend Andy Johnson from the airport and we drove to Willcox, AZ and twitched the Pacific Golden-plover that was being seen there.  

Andy and I then spent Sun, Mon and Tues birding around the Chiricahuas. He picked up all the lifers that he had missed last year including the high elevation birds like Olive Warbler and Short-tailed Hawk.  We also saw the now resident Flame-colored Tanagers and a nesting pair of Berylline Hummingbirds. 

On Wed, Andy and I took off for the Huachucas. We arrived mid morning and started at Ramsey Canyon. Not much there. A quick jaunt into Miller Canyon produced the usual hummingbirds at Beatty's. White-eared, Berylline, Broad-tailed, Broad-billed, Mag, ect

Mary Jo's in Ash Canyon had both male and female Lucifer Hummingbirds.

 Thurs, we hit San Pedro in the morning for Tropical Kingbird and then ran to Patagonia where we had excellent views of the Sinaloa Wren! 

 Paton's feeders had the usual Violet-crowned Hummingbird and Thick-billed Kingbird.  

On Fri morning, we birded Patagonia Preserve and added Beardless Tyrannulet to the list. Fri afternoon provided a fruitless search for Rufous-capped Warblers in Florida Canyon but we did find the lone Five-striped Sparrow that has been hanging out by the Sycamore tree there. 

Fri night, we planned on camping at Catalina state park. When we arrived in Tucson, the rain was coming down so hard, that you couldn't see the road in front of the car. Water was pooling on the road and people were hydroplaning everywhere. We drove into the state park, but when we came to the first wash, I took one look at the amount of rain coming down and quickly nixed the idea. We ended up camping in a hotel parking lot. 

Sat morning, we went back to the state park. The wash was covered with about a foot of sand. If we had camped in there the night before, we would have been stuck for a few hours. 

Having nothing to do at the park, we drove down to Sweetwater Wetlands where we talked to some people, saw a few water birds and then saw a family of Burrowing Owls: 

Then I dropped Andy at the airport and drove home to Portal. It was an amazing two weeks! 

Since then, I've been birding around the Chiricahuas, looking for new work and waiting until tomorrow. 

Tomorrow, VENT's Camp Chiricahua will be in town for the week! Camp Chiricahua is an ecology camp for high school aged kids. Although, the primary focus of the campers is birds, they do many other things too. It's an amazing camp and one I highly recommend. 

The leaders are Dave Jasper and Rob Day. Rob is an excellent cook and Dave is the most amazing trip leader ever! I could swear that he knows by name every living thing that resides in the Chiricahua mountains.  If you have a chance to go to this camp, do it! it's worth it! 

Til next time, Happy Birding! 

Quick update

Ok, so I have a couple posts about last weekend that I'll try to get in at some point. One of them includes a beautiful Cerulean Warbler that posed quite nicely for me. 

In the meantime, here's what happened to me since I left Wisco on Tuesday morning. 

Tues, May 5th: 

I left Wisco at about 9am and headed southwest.  A quick stop at Potosi Bottoms produced Great Egrets, a Louisiana Waterthrush, Yellow Warbler, Carolina Wren, Pelicans, and a few other interesting species.  

My next stop was Neal Smith NWR just south of Des Moines. The only new bird there was a Sedge Wren. Otherwise it was pretty quiet.  Then I decided to head to St Joeseph, MO for the night.  After some hunting, I stayed at Bluffwoods conservation park just south of the city. It was a very quiet little park and I awoke to singing Parulas and Louisiana Waterthrush. 

Wed, May 6th: 

I went searching for the Fork-tailed Flycatcher that had been seen last week. No sign of that bird. However, I did pick up Snowy Egret, Dickcissel, Orchard Oriole, and a few other birds. 

Then I hopped on highway 59 to Topeka, KS.   On the way, I noticed the transmission was slipping a little bit. When I arrived in Topeka, it wouldn't shift out of 1st gear. I pulled into a gas station to discover that the transmission fluid was literally pouring out from somewhere underneath the transmission.  I knew then that the car wasn't going any farther.  I asked around for a mechanic. The guy at the desk didn't know. I was about to start looking through the phonebook, when some guy walked up to me, handed me a card for a mechanic down the street, and walked away.  I don't know who he was, but I have him to thank for directing me to the right place.  

I called "The Rod Shop" and he had me bring the car down to the shop (it was literally right down the road.). So I practically rolled the car down in 1st gear.  

After debating and explaining the situation a bit, Rod agreed to turn it around as fast as possible.  

It turned out that Rod was the only mechanic on the street who wouldn't swindle out-of-staters into buying all new parts.  I lost almost two full days because of all the problems, but I can't thank Rod and his crew enough for not only fixing the transmission, but also for finding and fixing other potential problems as well. Hopefully, the next time my car is in the shop, the only thing it will need is an oil change. 

While hanging out in Topeka with no transportation and nothing to do, I walked around some of the roads nearby. Managed to pick up Great-tailed Grackle, Summer Tanager, Tennessee Warbler, Blackpoll Warbler, N Mockingbird and a few other birds. 

Today, Fri, May 8th: 

I picked up Spotted Towhee at Wilson State Park where I stayed last night.  Then I headed south to Cheyenne Bottoms WA. (aka, the best shorebird spot in the state of Kansas).  

There, I picked up 18 species of shorebirds including several thousand Wilson's Phalaropes, a few Red-necked Phalaropes, Long-billed Dowitcher, Stilt Sandpiper, American Avocet and others.  In Cheyenne Bottoms, there were many Eastern Kingbirds.  Between Cheyenne Bottoms and Dodge City, they all changed over to Western Kingbirds. It seemed as if there was one on every power line.  Between Dodge and Cimarron, it seemed as if there was a Scissor-tailed Flycatcher on every fence. 

On the way to Elkhart, KS, I finally nailed my #2 nemesis bird! I was driving along and was thinking that I had to be within the range of Mississippi Kite, but I wasn't sure. I stopped, checked the field guide, put the guide down, looked up, and there were two Mississippi Kites flying above my car! An awesome way to get a life bird!!  Now for my #1 nemesis bird. Painted Bunting!  But that's for tomorrow. 

I'm currently in Amarillo, TX. Visiting Palo Duro State Park tomorrow. Wish me luck!

No idea when I'll have internet again. I'll keep the updates coming as well as I can though. 

Happy Birding!