Arizona Part II: Beyond Chuffed or Lifers For Slick

Scott's Orioles are not known for being the most cooperative members of their tribe. But in Ash Canyon, they are jelly junkies, and it's easy to get quality looks.

I had come to Ash Canyon for two reasons: Lucifer Hummingbird, and geri-birding. It was hot, it was mid-afternoon, so what else is there to do but sit on your ass and let the birds come to you? Unfortunately Lucifer didn't show that day, but decent geri-birding was had.

Cooperative Lark Sparrow, with a bit of an overbite.

Acorn Woodpeckers are often described as being "clownish", which is too bad, because no one likes clowns and everyone likes Acorn Woodpeckers.

It's easy to take Acorn Woodpeckers for granted as a westerner. But just because something is easy means we should embrace it. Familiarity does breed contempt, but this is one of the great charismatic upland birds of the west, and they make everything better.

This young male Scott's Oriole is already a jelly addict. What is the world coming to?

Mexican Jays litter the mountains and hills of southeast Arizona. They are one of my favorite kinds of litter. 

After a night in Tucson, I got my shit together and rapidly lurked down to Florida Canyon, my old home from a few years ago. A Plain-capped Starthroat had been reported there recently, and it would be a solid ABA bird for me. The starthroat and residentish Black-capped Gnatcatchers didn't show, but it was a nice morning of Summer Tanagers, Varied Buntings, Gray Hawk (unusual there) and Northern Beardless-Tyrannulets.

Broad-billed Hummingbird is both crippling and common in the area. Florida Canyon, AZ.

Eventually I decided to hike up canyon, to revisit the Rufous-capped Warblers. Florida Canyon is the only place in the country where this species is reliable, and they have been here for several years now. Encountering no one on the trail was nice, because there are shitloads of birders in Arizona, and you are better off not encountering most of them. Eventually I heard a quiet, unusual song across the stream but could not locate it...I was momentarily distracted by a female Summer Tanager when she did me a solid and landed right next to the singing Rufous-capped Warbler. This is all part of being #7, you see.

It quickly skulked off, but I was happy. A few minutes later my avian company was replaced by a haggard-looking dude with a massive camera set up, his arms covered in cuts. He was sweating profusely, had a thick southern accent and kept calling me "Slick", which I'd never heard before outside of movies. He had obviously been trying really hard to see/photograph the Rufous-capped Warbler, and despite being there for hours had failed up to that point in the morning.

"It used to come into tapes," he said, with obvious disappointment in his voice.
"Well yeah. When everyone is using tapes on a bird, it will tape the bird out", I observantly pointed out to him.

I told him where I last had the bird and he stumbled over to the spot, looking forlornly at the slope that the warbler had previously occupied a few minutes earlier. Eventually he came back to me and said, "Hey Slick. I drove 3,000 miles for this, I'm going to play a tape." I responded unenthusiastically and got the fuck out of there.

There are few heartening things left in this world. One of them is watching a Black-throated Sparrow feeding a fledgling. Try it some time. Florida Canyon.

Later in the day, I rolled up to the Kubo Cabins, former home of the most dependable Flame-colored Tanager in the country. He must have passed away, but he was at those cabins for so many years that he must have had a nice, long, facemelting life...I was lucky to see him for many of those years. Good birds are still to be found there though...the guys I was geri-birding with at Ash Canyon the day before told me about an easy Whiskered Screech-Owl that sat in a cavity across the street from the cabins. It only took a couple minutes to find it, and I was a bit chuffed. In fact, before I knew it, I was beyond chuffed...I was fucking stoked.

This was my Arizona nemesis bird. I have birded the area extensively and have heard countless Whiskered Screech-Owls, but I could never actually see one...I don't count heard-only birds on my life list, so listening to them torture me at night was not going to cut it. And at long last, here it was, in broad daylight, right in front of me...sleeping.

This is one of the sleepier life birds I've gotten. Madera Canyon, AZ.

After the screech-owl success, it was time to take on Proctor Road. Proctor Road had the star attraction: a reliable, accessible Buff-collared Nightjar. Already happy with my victory over my nemesis earlier in the day, I would have been happy with just hearing the thing (I had no experience with them, aside from fondling a freshly deceased one in a shoe box in California...seriously).

As I arrived at the appointed spot, I came upon a familiar face.

"Hey Slick!", the familiar face beamed at me.

Are we in Men in Black? Are you Tommy Lee Fucking Jones? Do I look like Will Smith to you???? I wasn't surprised to see Tapey McGee there, but I was kind of bummed. Fortunately, he took off well before the time the bird was expected to begin calling (who knows why). Despite all of this, I'm glad there are still people out there calling people "Slick".

Having previously done field work in the area, I knew that I could get closer to the bird without getting too close...there was no reason to stick to the road, unless I wanted to be annoyed by other birders. So I lurked off into the bushes toward the nightjar's favored hill and waited. Eventually a birder from New York walked in to the shrubbery as well, and while we chatted the bird began calling. Great success! Shrewdly picking up on the fact that I was wallowing in the mesquite because I was trying to avoid birders, he headed back to the road. If only all birders were so adept on picking up social cues.

After he left, the bird began calling in earnest, and I could tell the bird had moved off the hill and was coming closer and closer. I drooled horribly, knowing that I had a chance of actually getting eyes on the thing. But as the suspense mounted, I heard some other birders pull up on the road behind me. They were not good birders. The nightjar was singing loudly, almost incessantly, and from the snippets of conversation I could hear it was obvious that the new birders had no clue they were listening to it (New York birder eventually pointed this out to them). New York birder later told me that they then asked if they could do playback, New York birder said "no", and they responded by saying they had driven too far and they were going to do it anyway. Sound familiar, Slick?

And so they began blasting nightjar song while the bird was still singing, and of course it immediately shut up. Heads were about to roll. But then the truly unexpected happened...the bird flew right by me, at eye level, and started singing again a couple hundred meters away before shutting up again. Holy shit!!!! It wasn't exactly a crippling view, but I quickly rocketed from chuffed to stoked to something like awe. What luck! I had almost no expectations of seeing it, and I ended up being the only person who saw the bird that night.

The playback dudes left, and I walked further down Proctor Road by myself. It was a beautiful, peaceful night. Soon other night birds began calling...Common Poorwills, a Lesser Nighthawk, an Elf owl, a Whiskered Screech-Owl. Eventually the Buff-collared Nightjar returned to the roadside and started calling, while another bird countersang in the distance. Such nightbirds! Two Buff-collared Nightjars (yes, I am positive it wasn't another birder using playback) and a whole suite of others. It was a good night. It was also my birthday...that night I camped in Bog Springs Campground in Madera Canyon and drank an impressive amount of bourbon.

These are Arizona Sisters. They look like California Sisters. But they are no more California Sisters than I am California Sisters. Madera Canyon.

The next day I hiked up Madera Canyon, all the way to the Carrie Nation Mine, where I don't think I've been before. I had some nice year birds...Red-faced Warbler, Cordilleran and Sulphur-bellied Flycatchers...and then it was time to leave. Although I prefer birding southeast Arizona during the monsoons, it was a hell of a trip, and I will be back. If you missed it, here is Arizona Part I.

Crushing songbirds can be difficult, so I recommend crushing other life forms in their stead. From time to time.

Unlike most songbirds, Yellow-eyed Juncos are eminently crushable, which pleases me. They are fearless birds, for reasons that I have only begun to grasp. I also am pleased with how closely they resemble Baird's (of Mexico) and Volcano Juncos (of Costa Rica and Panama), not to mention "red-backed" Dark-eyed Juncos. Madera Canyon.

I watched this junco thrash this lep into little bitty pieces. It was intensely violent and fun to see. Nerd points to anyone who can identify the prey.

Ever since that day, I wake up every morning and am grateful that I am not a medium-sized lepidopteran that dwells in high-elevation springs of the sky islands of southeast Arizona. Junco-bashing must be a rough way to go.

The harmful bellow of a Plumbeous Vireo is truly something to avoid. At least it is uttered more intermittently than Cassin's. Madera Canyon.

For the herpers, here is a Yarrow's Spiny Lizard (I think). Madera Canyon.

You Know It Looks A Lot Like Last Year

Jesus. It's the middle of December. There isn't a lot of color to look at around there this time of year, if you take away some ducks and the hordes of Townsend's Warblers in my neighborhood...but I can't complain too much, California has it good compared to forlorn places like North Dakota, Kansas and Maine.

Since I move around so much, its strange to look back and realize that right now I'm doing the exact same thing as this time last year...same house, same friends, same worries, same routine....but with a substantially higher year list. One of the big differences is my January roadtrip will take me to the Pacific Northwest, instead of Eastern Mexico....these areas essentially have nothing in common, but I am optimistic things will get just as weird, minus the food poisoning and armed robbery business.

Right. Here is a Broad-billed Hummingbird (from my previous home in Florida Canyon, AZ) to guide you into the glorious weekend. See you soon.

Passion Unabated Will Be Readily Conflated

Black-chinned and Broad-billed (the strange glowing thing in the background) Hummingbirds. Florida Canyon, AZ.

My indigent lackies who slave away in the BB&B basement have finally come up with a topic that we have not touched on yet: feeding wildlife. Ok. Lets take a look at it.

People feed wildlife all the time. There are probably millions of bird feeders all around the world. At city parks and waterfronts everywhere people feed ducks, geese, swans, gulls, squirrels....even monkeys in some places. This has been going on for a long, long time, and it's not going to stop anytime soon. Then of course there are the myriad rodents, possums, skunks, raccoons, bears, etc. that also fill up on what the other animals don't eat, usually at night.

The standard opinion amongst American wildlife biologists is that no wildlife should be fed by people at any time except for in the most extreme circumstances, such as when they are trying to stabilize or boost the population of an endangered species (a la giving carcasses to California Condors). Why the extreme view? Potentially, wildlife can become habituated to humans (which potentially puts them more at risk to injury or death by various dumbasses, dogs off leash, etc) and view them as a source of food (human food lacks a lot of the nutrition wild animals need). When they congregate in large masses (i.e. at bird feeders), this puts them at risk for spreading of disease, which indeed does happen at unkempt feeding stations. And if wildlife change their habits to exploit certain food sources (i.e. stay in an exposed, snowy, freezing place instead of going someplace warm), then that can just lead to them dying. Perhaps the most obvious example of this conflict is the classic Yogi Bear situation, in which potentially large and dangerous animals learn to associate people with food. A friend of mine actually lost a loved one due to something like this happening....so this is no joke. So not only is this not good for people, it's bad for the animals, because the ones that get a little too comforatable with people either end up shot or getting relocated, which is not necessarily that much better.

There are many more reasons to not feed animals, but I don't want to bore you, especially if ya'll know this already. As an exception, I have met relatively few people who are against the standard backyard birdfeeder scenario, as there is scant evidence to support the ideas that feeders will stop birds from migrating or switching to healthier food sources when it comes time to lay eggs and raise some chickies. Feeding birds is also extremely Quaint, and its really hard to publically come out against something that gives both you, your grandmother and your children a source of joy.

California (?) Ground-Squirrels. No food was dispensed in the making of these images. Morro Bay, CA.

Got it? Good. FEEDING WILDLIFE BAD. Now, as you may have anticipated, I have a slightly different take on all of this. For one, there are certainly situations in which feeding wildlife (and just littering, although its sad that I need to state that) can be extremely detrimental. I need not mention Yogi and friends. But take Humboldt County for instance. On Clam Beach, there is a population of Snowy Plovers that nest there. This being a Threatened species in the state of California, is a big deal. So when you feed gulls, ravens (intentionally), foxes, skunks, raccoons and rats (unintentionally), you are encouraging more and more of these predators to come around, get fat, breed more, and eat more Snowy Plover eggs/chickies. This is bad. In the old redwood forests, feeding squirrels, ravens and jays can lead to the same thing happening to the embattled Marbled Murrelets that nest there. So boosting populations of these versatile and capable predators is most certainly a big problem that could have heavy implications.

On the other hand, I think it can be pretty harmless in some cases. Take these squirrels above. They live in the rip-rap at the edge of Morro Bay, and are completely habituated to people and take handouts on the regular. There are two reasons I think this is not a big deal. A) Countless people stop by and hang out with these things. A few birders thinking they are doing some great deed by resisting the urge to toss one a crumb will not change the situation at all. B) They're squirrels living in a tiny margin of rocks between the road and the ocean. It's a pretty crappy place to live. I highly doubt that these fat things, buoyed by some crazy mix of nutrition (a discarded 4LOKO, perhaps?), are prone to leap down in a bloodthirsty rage upon unsuspecting turnstones poking around in the barnacles. Its just not a big deal. Now I don't think feeding them is a good idea, but get real. It's not the end of the world. 

As an aside, I am 100% against the feeding of stray cats. Feeding them does not stop them from killing birds, and god knows how many other reptiles, amphibians and undeserving native rodents. Cats (feral and otherwise) kill MILLIONS of birds in the United States each year. Most biologists are on the same team on this one. There is a legendary story about someone I know beating a cat to death with a stick in front of a stunned, blue-haired Audubon group. Now I don't condone this in any way, and I don't know if I'm even capable of doing something like that (I actually like cats)....but it makes a good story.

An Arizona Woodpecker harmlessly hones in on some suet. Paradise, AZ.

I guess all I'm saying is, there are few issues that are completely black and white, especially within the scientific community. I remember when I was a little kid, some Western Scrub-Jays would raise a couple chicks every year and would always spend a couple months with their family hanging out with my family. I loved that shit. I'm almost getting misty-eyed just thinking about it. Anyways, after a while the jays knew the deal and we would know the deal, and pretty soon the birds would be hopping into our kitchen to see if we had any snacks (FYI raw, unsalted nuts are not bad jay food). This had quite the impact on an impressionable young Steve. Now, getting on 20 years later, we still have jays that come sit in the same tree and yell at us to come outside. One is obliging enough to sit on your hand to grab a peanut. Call me sentimental, but I'd like to think they are the some of the same birds that we hosted so many years ago. Again, I don't recommend inviting wild animals into your kitchen, but perhaps this experience played a roll in me becoming the Uberbirder I am today.

If your child shows more interest in feeding your local park ducks than trying to kill them (which seems to be most kids who are capable of walking), then I say let  'em toss a cracker in to the lot. Live a litttle.

Have a weird Thanksgiving or Thanksfornothing (depending on where you are). I know I will.

If You've Got Two Kidneys Then You've Got One To Spare

Forster's Tern or Angel Of Death?

So check this out.  Last night I slept in General Hitchcock Campground off the Catalina Highway (Mt Lemmon area).  A Whiskered Screech-Owl and the first Flammulated Owl I've heard in many years sung sweet lullabies, but shortly after I fell asleep I was awakened by a Whip-poor-will that was singing enthusiastically next to my car.  If you are not acquainted, a Whip-poor-will is a relatively large, nocturnal bird that simply says, with much gusto and volume, "whip-poor-will!" over and over and over and over again at night.  I've only ever seen/heard a few, so I was stoked to be sleeping next to one.....but it kept waking me up all night.

Early morning at Organ Pipe National Monument.

The deadly and powerful Mexican Jay.

At one point, it invaded my dreams.  I dreamt I was standing in a large house, listening to this Whip-poor-will, trying to figure out where the hell it was.  I looked into a large room to try to find it, and was surprised to see a beautiful, topless, large-breasted girl in a bed.  We started talking, whilst the Whip-poor-will continued unabated.  At this point, I was pretty stoked.  Who gets to see boobs and listen to Whip-poor-wills at the same time? 

Another Broad-billed Hummingbird.  They've thinned out from our cabin lately.  I'll miss them!

This is the massive Blue-throated Hummingbird, the behemoth of hummers that can be found north of Mexico.  They kick around the almost-as-big Magnificent Hummingbirds with impunity.  You can't really see the true scale of this bird in the picture, but its about the size of a Cessna.

Suddenly, I was bombarded with the awful sound that was my alarm clock.  The girl and her bed and the house dissolved into blackness.  It was a quarter after four in the morning, and I was sleeping in my filthy car in a parking lot somewhere on a mountain in Arizona.  The nearby Whip-poor-will, realizing the tragedy that had just befallen me, gave me some more cheerful encouragement before I drove slowly up the mountain.  Hopefully my nocturnal buddy had a better morning than I did.

I Don't Have A Social Life Anymore

One of the many facemelty Broad-billed Hummingbirds that run things next to our house.

Lets face it: you came here to read about disgusting, unspeakable things, so lets talk about a crucial aspect of field work….pooping.  You crazed fecalphiliacs will finally get what you want.  When you are miles from the nearest bathroom all the time, you usually can’t really postpone your bodily functions until when you are within city limits once more...and so it is likely that field biologists and their ilk may lay down the deuce in the out-of-doors as much or more than any other profession.  It’s no big deal, although it can get…..interesting, at times.  Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to share the fun with your avian friends.

How To Get A Buff-breasted Flycatcher To Watch You Take A Dump:

Step 1: Go to Filiberto’s in Sierra Vista, Arizona, on a fine spring evening, and get the #17 combo.  This consists of 2 chile rellenos, beans, rice, shredded lettuce, salsa, sour cream, hot sauce, and a massive tortilla.  Consume as much as you possibly can, preferably leaving you in a sort of catatonic state.

Carr Peak, one of our survey sites.  The snow adds to the scenery but mostly adds to the misery.

Step 2: Wake up the next morning at 4:30 AM at the bottom of Carr Canyon.  Curse the forest service for pointlessly keeping the road closed, forcing you to walk the 4 miles uphill to where flycatchers lurk.

 A male Arizona Woodpecker in our Florida Canyon yard.  Brown pride.

Step 3: After being hooted encouragement by a female Mexican Spotted Owl, propel yourself uphill with the abundant flatulence that is being fueled by Filiberto’s from the preceding evening.  I recommend a mix of determined marching and defeated trudging to carry you up the mountain.

The Santa Cruz River is littered with shit that immigrants drop on their way north.  Not Dre.

Step 4: Locate Buff-breasted Flycatchers at Reef Townsite Campground.  They will be loud and looking to be noticed.  By this time your abdomen is seriously distended and about to explode.  Relieve yourself while flycatchers are perched overhead and call and sing their jubilation at witnessing this momentous event.  Note their depravity, and whatever you do…….don’t look back.

This Say's Phoebe really knows how to beautify a perch.

It's Not That I Don't Like You, It's Just That I'm At A Party

Zone-tailed Hawks evolved to appear and fly like Turkey Vultures, so as to appear harmless to their intended victims. They also evolved to be fantastic.

Jesus, the Top 40 is shit.  Most of it was clearly written for people who have significant brain damage.  Ironically, I listen to it all the time, now that my ipod adapter in my car bit the dust and I have accepted that I'm a total masochist.  When NPR is mind-numbingly boring, I go straight to 93.7....although I don't know how much longer I can do that without driving off a cliff.  At least I still have love for Lady Gaga.

So I do stuff all the time now, and some crud too.  Field work, entering data, birding and prepping for a cold and wet Alaskan summer leave little time for much else beyond writing on this thing and watching my hummingbirds.  I love the shit out of these little bastards.  Living with wildlife around is so much more satisfying than a drab, mind-numbing city apartment that is something straight out of the mind of George Orwell (thats you, San Francisco friends).  I finally met the Ringtail Cat that lives in our house Saturday night, and I think I pissed myself a little bit.

Here's a video Elias Elias (aka E-Squared Gallery) took of one of our hummingbird feeders with his iphone, from a few feet away.

So Sprung On The Fast Life

The Martin House.  My home for the spring.  It comes complete with Acorn Woodpecker holes drilled into the side.

BB&B has got obscene traffic after that last blog post, which was bursting up with nuptial plumes.  BB&B hegemony of the blogosphere has begun....don't call me narcissistic, call me realistic, you know what I'm saying?  It's only a matter of time.....

Whatever.  On Friday, with some warm weather late in the morning, saw our first Costa's Hummingbird, Anna's Hummingbirds, Rufous Hummingbirds, and Arizona Woodpeckers lurk into our yard.  At least one more Broad-billed Hummingbird showed up too, much to the dislike of the local, seemingly territorial bird.  The Mexican family that lives with us also seemed louder and more vigorous than usual (I'm talking about jays, of course).

Other birds of note last week were 2 Williamson's Sapsuckers, a Golden Eagle and a flock of Golden-crowned Kinglets up Madera Canyon, and a couple Dusky Flycatchers on the Santa Cruz River.  The amount of garbage in the riverbed is astounding....most of it consists of beverage containers left by migrant hispanics heading northward to salvation.  However, the shit they leave behind is relatively insignificant compared to the damage caused by cattle that are left to roam free in the riparian.

Below are a few of the local avian residents around the house.

Canyon Towhee....formerly the Brown Towhee, for obvious reasons.  Fortunately, economy of style goes a long way around these parts.

Yellow-eyed Junco.  A very aptly named bird.  Stare too long and your brain will freeze, rendering you unable to move.  That's when they attack....

A male Broad-billed Hummingbird.  This one was at the Paton's in Patagonia, our resident is face-meltier.

Ten Billion People Marching Your Way

A Broad-billed Hummingbird stretches out while it still has the room.

Overpopulation. Its a scary concept, really. In many places in the world, it is already a fact of life. Malnutrition and the threat of starvation are constants in many peoples lives. Forests, wetlands, marshes are burned, drained and paved over to make way for people and cows and crops. Clean water is a luxury, not something to flush down a toilet. 27,000 species go extinct each year in tropical forests alone. Global warming makes us all sound doomed.

Parched, cracked mouths, empty swollen guts
sun-baked pavement encroaches on us
Haves and have-nots together at last
Brutally engaged in mortal combat

What kind of god would orchestrate such a thing?
Ten billion people all suffering
Truth is not an issue, just hungry mouths to feed
Forget what you want, scrounge the things you need.
- From Bad Religion's Ten in 2010

Privately, most of my friends and colleagues alike think population regulation is not only a good idea, it is completely necessary for the natural world and human world alike (although any distinction is arguable). As places like China and India become wealthier, their consumption rates will go up and up. China surpassed the United States in the last year in the amount of "resources" they use up annually. Imagine dozens of nations that have people who want to live a lifestyle like the wasteful, privileged ones we lead in the United States, that get a little closer to it every year. People must be able to live with some security (and I'm not talking about the Homeland variety), but this is not something the Earth will be able to take for very long.

There are almost 7 Billion people in the world right now....that's a lot of people!

China, to my knowledge, is the only country that has an active policy that controls the number of children people can have. The single-child policy has prevented the births of approximately 400 million people to date, which is considerably more than the entire population of the United States. As my good friend and colleague Nice Lady pointed out, this has resulted in many orphaned children and a lopsided sex ratio (in traditional Chinese culture, boys are expected to care for their parents when they get older, so are often the favored gender when people have a child), and who knows how many other problems. But the law seems to be a success on some levels, with no plans or any serious discussion to discontinue it.

Well we've all got the right guaranteed by the state,
And even a god demands that it's my job
Just to procreate
For everyone to feed something's gotta bleed
Now are you going to take until there's nothing to do but leave?

Bulldoze and level the loam
Ag land under your home
The fire in the jungle is hard to contain
The factory farm don't make it easy to sustain
People with a narrow scope
Market a supply of disposable hope
And the masses will demand it every day....

- From Cobra Skulls' Overpopulated

Aside from China, there is almost no serious discussion in the public sphere about overpopulation and how to cope with it....which is understandable....its a political nightmare in any country and any culture. You just can't tell people they can't have kids. It violates people's most basic sense of freedom, and to suggest otherwise would come across fascist. In many places it is traditional to have large, sprawling families, and when people cling to notions that contraception is wrong and abortion is worse than killing an actual human being, there is no chance. Then there is the fact that God himself wants you to breed. And how do you even start this conversation with somebody who has a couple of young children? Talk about offensive.

This is the political reality, and the world is worse for it.

I don't have any solution to this, other to recommend that that you don't have a litter of kids Octomom-style, to stop eating cheap meat constantly and to watch what you buy and what you throw away. Or.....do what you think is best.

Shut The Door So I Can Leave

An epic Madera Canyon sunset was a solid crowd-pleaser.

Well.....it seems Ive made it. I write to you, late on a Saturday night, from the Hidden Valley Four Seasons Resort, a posh piece of property that I would normally have no business on, seeing that A) I am not of the Elite and B) I have no interest, of any kind, that would motivate me to be here even if I could afford it.....although the trap and skeet range does strike my on-again off-again fancy with firearms.

What am I doing here? Monday I start my new job with Bat Conservation International, whom I will be working for until the middle of October.....and for reasons that I have yet to fully understand, the field housing for the project is located exclusively at this resort. I'm holed up in this condo, complete with loft, fireplace, a big stack of firewood, and all the essential furniture items, kitchenware, etc. Aside from the food and alcohol situation (which really is a whole situation in and of itself.....I'll explain later), I'm completely self-contained.

The journey out here, of course, was far more interesting than the destination....so far. But there are a lot of pictures.....so many pictures......so in order to capture the nerdy spirit of the thing I will just post a bunch of nonhuman (Inhuman?) pictures from Southeast Arizona, one of the birding meccas of United States.



A Monsoonbow off of Hwy 19, north of Madera Canyon.



The resident male Flame-Colored Tanager outside Madera Kubo Cabins.



Gobble Gobble Gobble Gobble Gobble Gobble Gobble.....

I got to a bird around Southeast Arizona with a bunch of half-crazies, the stars of which were veterans from the 2007/2008 Imperial Valley Burrowing Owl seasons. It was a breezy experience, to say the least. Berylline Hummingbirds and Buff-breasted Flycatchers were both new to me.....and I think it is safe to say, at this juncture, that things will never be the same. To put it bluntly, southeastern Arizona is a facemelting place to look at birds, and can test you physically and mentally....I've found myself Out There, on that high, jagged edge, more than once over the years. The intense heat and rigorous schedule of trying to see as much as you can in just a few days can do a number on you......but nothing a little rattlesnake won't cure, you know what I'm sayin'?

I start work tomorrow out here in the PA, I'll let you know how it goes. Otherwise, I'll post some more All-American Goodness from The Road in the near future.......until then, hold it down!



A bloodthirsty Brown-crested Flycatcher delivers its defeated prey to its bloodthirstier nestlings in the power pole. Shortly after this picture was taken, the flycatcher pair were documented attempting to stuff a small child into a cavity.



Two or three White-eared Hummingbirds were holding down the feeders at Beatty's in Miller Canyon. A truly awesome creature.



A Berylline Hummingbird in the process of assembling a giant, chewbaccaesque figure. No one quite understands the reasons for this.



A bedazzling male Broad-billed Hummingbird.



A Black-chinned Hummingbird shows off its chin-bling.



Although not a good picture, I kind of like it. Beware the Hooded Oriole that attacks by lamplight.