Listing Through Life

polioptila (from polios, gray, and ptilon, feather) californica (of California)

Thursday, February 19, 2015

Crystal Cove State Park — Orange County, California

This was one of my target birds for the trip. It’s an endangered species and can only be found in certain types of scrubby, dry, coastal habitats in Southern California — right where the ridiculous sprawl of Los Angeles consumes the landscape. It was my primary reason for going to the North Etiwanda Preserve on Wednesday morning, and when I struck out there, I figured I’d missed it.

It was approaching eleven o’clock. The beach down below was getting crowded with people. I had a long drive back to Ontario and a plane to catch. The path I was on paralleled the highway and curved downhill toward the parking lot. My birding adventure was almost over.

Then I spotted a couple White-crowned sparrows in a bush on the edge of the bluff. As I was looking at them through my binoculars, I saw a smaller bird fly into the bush. It was a gnatcatcher, and it had a definite black crown. It could only be a California Gnatcatcher, but it wasn’t acting at all like a rare, endangered species.

It’s the only gnatcatcher with a black cap found along the coast. But the defining characteristic is the underside of the tail — black with white tips to the feathers. I saw this clearly without question through my binoculars, but never got a better photo of it than what can be seen in this next shot. You can get a hint of the pattern if you enlarge the photo.

It flew off into the brush out of sight, but I could hear its cat-like calls from time to time. I continued down the path. About three minutes later, I spotted it and a female chasing each other through the bushes. They flew across the path into the narrow strip between the path and the road. For a minute, I thought they were building a nest there, but I think they were just collecting stuff for a nest elsewhere. The male popped up on a branch a few feet away and stayed just long enough for me to get one photo.

The gnatcatchers were soon off again, chasing through the bushes on the ocean side. I soon lost sight of them, although I heard the call a couple more times.

Kinda funny how birding works sometimes. Spend a morning out in the wild looking for a bird where it is supposed to be, only to find it the next morning along a busy highway where it isn’t expected.

selasphorus (from selas, light, and phoros, bearing) sasin (origin not known) English name for Charles A. Allen, 19th-century California bird collector

Thursday, February 19, 2015

Crystal Cove State Park — Orange County, California

I had a mid-afternoon flight home. I wasn’t about to sit around my hotel for eight hours, so I decided to head for the coast to get in a few more hours of birding. Crystal Cove State Park, in Orange County, seemed like the best bet. I could avoid driving through the worst of the congestion and, while it would take me two hours to get there in morning traffic, it would only take an hour to get back at midday. And there were two lifers that were listed as common on the park bird list — California Quail and Wandering Tattler.

I parked near the Crystal Cove Beach Cottages and walked south along the beach for about a mile. It was high tide and in a few places there was very little room between the surf and the bluff. I was able to walk right up to several species of shorebirds, but saw no Tattlers. When I got to the end of the park, I could walk back the way I’d just come and, probably, see all the same birds, or I could climb the trail to the top of the bluff and walk back along the edge. I opted for the latter.

The morning had been foggy and gray, but by this time the sun was out and the view was spectacular.

I’d been seeing Anna’s Hummingbirds everywhere I’d been birding, and I was seeing a lot of them here too. When I spotted a tiny bird in a bush right at the edge of the bluff, I assumed it was another Anna’s. It wasn’t. It was a male Allen’s Hummingbird. It perched cooperatively facing away from me while I got a good look, then turned around and gave me a good view from the front. It was about 20 yards away from the path and my camera kept focusing on the bush in front of it, so my photos aren’t very sharp.

It sat there for about five minutes. You can see it in the lower left corner of this photo I took of Brown Pelicans flying by.

It’s a little embarrassing to admit that, after I identified it, I wasn’t sure if I’d seen one before. But a check of my list convinced me I had another, unexpected, lifer.

artemisiospiza (from artemisio, ?, and spiza, finch) belli (named for John G. Bell, a naturalist who was a friend of Audubon)

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

North Etiwanda Preserve in Rancho Cucamonga, California

This place had the essentials — it was close enough to Ontario to get there and back before I had to start working, and two would-be lifers are seen there regularly.

The Preserve consists of a large, rocky sage and brush-covered area at the base of the mountains north of Rancho Cucamonga.

I arrived early and had the place to myself for the first twenty minutes. Other people — hikers, not birders — began showing up soon afterwards. But it never got crowded except on the side trail to a small waterfall.

I wasn’t there long before I spotted a Bell’s Sparrow singing in a small bush off the trail. I soon saw others, probably about 10 in total, some of which were very close and many of which were singing.