Listing Through Life

chloroceryle americana

Rio Rico, Arizona — Guy Tobin Trailhead on the De Anza Trail

Monday, May 9, 2022 — 12:06 pm

A woman I met in Tubac assured me that the Rio Rico section of trail, where I’d been earlier in the morning, was safe and that it was THE place to see Green Kingfishers. So I returned.

I knew they were most often seen flying up and down the river. I also knew they were a great deal smaller than Belted Kingfishers — about the size of a Song Sparrow, but with a disproportionately long bill that gives it another inch or two of length. I walked along the river, watching for the kingfisher but also enjoying the Black Phoebe, Tropical Kingbird, Vermilion Flycatcher, and Phainopeplas in the area.

I’d been there about 15 minutes when I reached a straight stretch of river crossed by a small, rickety footbridge. I saw the kingfisher flash by, almost too quickly to comprehend. It was low over the water as it went by, perhaps 15 feet away from me. Just then a guy walked up behind me and asked if that was the kingfisher. I turned toward him to say yes when he said, “There goes another one.” I turned back in time to catch a glimpse of a small green bird heading downstream after the first one.

The guy introduced himself as David, and we talked kingfishers and the best way to see them. He’d looked at his watch as it went by and saw that it was exactly 12:06. We scanned all the low branches above the river where Green Kingfishers like to hang out and explored across the river a little. We had just crossed back over the bridge when a single kingfisher — the male with a red chest — flew back upstream. David marked that 22 minutes had gone by. It was now 12:28. We waited for the second one to follow but didn’t see it. I stayed there while David walked upstream to look for the one that had just passed. Twenty-four minutes went by this time. I had my camera ready and was poised to take a photo. Suddenly I saw a tiny white flash coming my way. I panned my camera and took a shot. Here’s the photo I got. At first, I thought I’d missed the bird but then I took a closer look.

It doesn’t look like much, but when I zoom on the upper right corner, I see this.

David came down and asked if I’d seen it. I showed him my photo. The bird had actually landed in a tangle of branches right across from where he was standing, and he showed me a blurry photo. He said he’d tried to warn me it was coming, but I hadn’t heard him.

I returned two days later to try for a better photo. This time it was the female that was making the flights up and down, and she was on a different schedule. There were four other birders there, and we waited by the bridge for a long time. I finally I spotted the bird heading upstream and pointed her out to the others. The bird was moving so fast that not everyone saw her. We waiting well past 22 minutes. I finally walked upstream to see if she had landed. A few minutes later, one of the other birders came up to tell me it had just flown right past me. Nobody had gotten photos. A lot of birders go to that spot, and some are lucky enough to see one of the kingfishers perch. Here’s a photo of the same bird I photographed taken by someone else a few days later in the same location.

And here’s someone else’s photo of the female I saw on Wednesday.

I wish I had gotten photos like this, but I actually saw both birds very well as they flashed by.

camptostoma imberbe

Tubac, Arizona — De Anza Trail

Monday, May 9, 2022 — 10:27 am

I was looking and listening for this bird as I walked through the woods along the Santa Cruz River to the becard nest. The tyrannulet song is a series of clear notes that descend the scale, an easy song to recognize and remember. It’s a Mexican bird that just reaches the US in south Texas and southeastern Arizona.

On my way back to the car, I saw a tiny bird flitting through the mesquite. I was hanging around the area to get a better look when a long parade of birders walked by — another guided tour. As the leader walked past the tree, he said, “Oh, there’s a Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet and its nest.” He proceeded to tell how he’d seen in Texas. He explained how they find clumps of vegetation and, rather than start from scratch on a nest, adapt it for their purposes. He said he was really interested to find out if they did the same thing in Arizona and now he knew they did. It was all very convincing. Later, I mentioned that I’d seen this bird to two other guides, and both of them knew exactly where the nest was. It was a stop on their tours to the becard nest. This guy was pretending he’d just discovered it.

Anyway, I soon spotted the tyrannulet in a nearby bush, singing its song. I’m convinced I would have heard it, recognized it, and seen it even if the group hadn’t happened along when they did. They were all gathered around waiting for the bird to return to its nest, so I was stuck on the wrong side of the tree. But when they’d all had their fill and moved on, I moved around to the other side. One woman from the tour who liked to actually see the birds well and wasn’t a fan of being ‘hurried along” stuck around and chatted with me. The tyrannulet came back and ducked into the nest to feed its young. It then popped back out, sang once from a nearby branch, and disappeared. Five minutes later it returned and did the same thing — one song every visit. Stupidly, I stopped the video (below) just a half second before the bird sang.

The notable field marks of the  Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet are it’s small size — think kinglet — the bushy crest, the short, stubby bill, and the fact that it has no rictal bristles around the base of its bill (the last mark gives the bird its “beardless” designation).

I watched three or four visits to the nest and then headed on my way. I saw another one at Patagonia Lake State Park on Tuesday and one on Wednesday in Montosa Canyon when I was concentrating on finding the Five-striped Sparrow.

pachyramphus aglaiae

Tubac, Arizona — De Anza Trail

Monday, May 9, 2022 — 9:52 am

This Rose-throated Becard is another bird that’s been on the rare bird report for months. They nest annually in the tall sycamores along this section of the Santa Cruz River, although this year, nobody has seen a male. The female, however, is busy building a nest about 50 feet away from last year’s nest. The spot is so well known that it’s actually on Google maps. Becards are generally migratory, but the ones at this location have begun hanging around all year. They look somewhat like flycatchers, but eat mainly fruit. The wide-necked, black-capped, large-headed look sets them apart.

I parked further south than I needed to and had a two mile walk north along the trail to get to the bird. It wasn’t hard to find the nest — there were seven or eight birders standing around staring up.

The nest was a huge clump of leaves and sticks, about the size of a beach ball. It hung high in the canopy of sycamores.

The nest in the photo above can be seen again in the lower right of this photo. The clump in the upper middle-left is last year’s nest.

I joined the group of birders, and we stood around chatting. After maybe 15 minutes we saw a grayish bird fly out of the nest and into the woods. Twenty minutes later, it reappeared with a six inch strip of bark in its bill. It perched on a nearby branch for about a minute, flew briefly to another, closer branch, then flew to the nest and disappeared.

A few minutes later, one of the birders said, “on to the next bird,” and walked off. All the others followed obediently. I had unknowingly inserted myself into a guided bird walk. I stuck around another five minutes but didn’t see the becard again.

myiarchus tyrannulus

Rio Rico, Arizona — Guy Tobin Trailhead on the De Anza Trail

Monday, May 9, 2022 — 7:15 am

I woke up at 5:15 and decided I might as well go birding. I headed southwest to the town of Rio Rico and birded along the Santa Cruz River, one of the very few rivers I’ve seen in Arizona that actually had water — it’s about 10 feet wide and four inches deep. The trail was just a thin dirt track through scrubby woods and wasn’t very impressive. I went there because Green Kingfishers are reported regularly.

I very soon heard and saw a flycatcher that looked very much like the Great Crested Flycatchers I know from Illinois. It was singing frequently while looking around from a dead branch. A few times during the 10 minutes I observed it, it flew to another perch in the riverside cottonwoods.

The area felt sketchy, so I didn’t stay long. (I was assured by other birders that it’s safe, and so I returned two other times.) I saw other Brown-crested Flycatchers later this day along the trail by Tubac and at Paton’s in Patagonia. In fact, once I learned their calls, I saw them pretty much everywhere I went in southern Arizona, even up near Tucson. They aren’t quiet birds. At Tubac I saw one chasing another flycatcher that turned out to be a closely-related Ash-throated Flycatcher. The Brown-crested was flying so close behind the somewhat smaller bird that it almost looked to be riding it.

The large bill, the fairly bright yellow on the belly, and the rufous on the central tail feathers that extends all the way to the tip distinguish it from the Ash-throated Flycatcher.

I’m almost certain this is another one (below) because of the large bill. I spotted it at Paton’s the night before my lifer sighting but didn’t count it because I hadn’t heard it and hadn’t seen the underside of the tail.

columbina talpacoti

Patagonia, Arizona — Paton Center for Hummingbirds

Sunday, May 8, 2022 — 5:11 pm

First of all, let me say that the Latin name of this bird sounds like a pasta dish at a fancy Italian restaurant.

This particular Ruddy Ground-Dove had been showing up on the rare bird reports all spring. Although I don’t get terribly excited about doves, I wanted to see it, of course. I was off by myself by the parking area, trying to get decent photos of the Violet-crowned Hummingbird, when the dove came to the feeders. It usually stays on the ground in and around a brush pile where the caretaker scatters seed, and that’s what it did this afternoon. I was a little put off when I found out it had been seen and nobody had mentioned it, but it soon returned, and I got good looks — along with everyone else. (The guy on the far left, and the woman on the right who is staring at me were married. They live out of their RV. I kept running into them at Paton’s, and we chatted regularly and joked around. When I saw them for the third or fourth time, I said, “If we keep meeting like this, we’ll have to exchange Christmas Cards.” They had a bumper sticker on their camper that said, “Don’t be condescending. That’s when you talk down to someone.”) The crowd is due to the bird’s rarity. It’s a Mexican species that only occasionally ventures north into the Southwestern states.

Back to the dove. It’s a little bit larger than, but otherwise similar to, the Common Ground-Doves that also came to the feeders from time to time. It lacks the scaled look on the breast that Common has (evident on the video). The Ruddy has a gray head and is otherwise a reddish-brown, like it was dipped in stain. It acted like a typical dove, walking slowly around making quick stabs at the ground for seed. On the first day, with a crowd of people watching, it hung around for maybe five minutes, never venturing far from the brush pile. It was near a couple Inca Doves, another small dove of the Southwest.

Two days later, I was by myself at Paton’s early in the morning. I spotted the dove again. It was more out in the open this time, feeding with a Common Ground-Dove and a White-winged Dove, giving good side-by-side comparisons. (See the second two clips on the video.)

The Ruddy Ground-Dove is the blurry bird in the background. The one in the foreground is a Common Ground-Dove.

The first two clips on the video were taken on Sunday afternoon, the last two early Tuesday morning. In the latter, the Ruddy is feeding with a slightly-smaller Common Ground-Dove and a much larger White-winged Dove.