Sierra Summer Birding Part I

Back in early June, Billy and I ditched the bay area and headed east into the Sierras. We were destined for Mono County, but to get there we had to endure the grotesque and horrible Yosemite National Park. Most people go to Yosemite Park, but I have a habit of just driving through it on the Lee Vining-Oakland commute. There are worse places to have to endure...in fact, most places are worse. We did stop and walk around a few random spots...no complaints about Mountain Quail, Olive-sided Flycatcher, Townsend's Solitaire, Nashville and MacGillivray's Warblers, Green-tailed Towhees...not to mention delicious, fresh mountain air. A few Mountain Bluebirds were taking in the air at Tuolumne Meadows (above).

This yellow-bellied marmot was holding it down at the meadows as well. Good luck getting this as a lowland vagrant.

Nothing was blooming in the meadows yet...a good portion was still under water. The marmot was probably still groggy from being asleep for months, unlike their Pika relatives who stay awake through the winter.

That afternoon and the following day was spent bouncing around Mono Basin...Vesper, Brewer's and Sagebrush Sparrows were quality year birds, and what I think was a Black-throated Sparrow (only sang once from a great distance away) was almost a nice year bird as well. Some Brant at Mono County Park (later seen at Rush Creek Delta on the south side of the lake) were pleasantly rare, and a bewildering number of Virginia Rails made a cacophony of unfamiliar sounds...they do more than just grunt, take that to heart. A couple random Geris (not birders) pointed out a Golden Eagle nest up Lundy Canyon, and thus I got my lifer Golden Eagle chick. The Grub showed us what he had been doing with the DeChambeau/County Ponds...I think he is determined to pull in some kind of meguh vague runt there some day, but he is currently content to nurture the sizable Yellow-headed Blackbird colony; a lone ibis and Blue-winged Teal were deec county birds for me. White-breasted Nuthatches of the Great Basin flavor were fairly common and scattered about, patiently waiting to be split into their own species. Looking for Black-backed Woodpeckers at a burn along Owens River Road was fruitless, but we did get White-headed Woodpecker, Bank Swallow and a weird sunbow (above).

That night I got hammered at the Mono Inn, which was entirely predictable.

The next morning we headed up to Virginia Lakes, which is heck of high, hella scenic and features one of the few decent Geribirding spots in the entire state. Mountain Chickadees were there (not shocking), and I hung out with this particularly confiding bird for a bit as it foraged close by.

Mountain Chickadee is my favorite chickadee...maybe from birding Lockwood Valley (Ventura County) as a kid, but I'm not entirely sure why. They sound superior to all other chickadees, in my opinion, and they've got that white eyebrow that sets them apart from everything else. Boreal Chickadees are cool, but all the others haven't built a cavity nest in my heart like Mountain Chickadees have. I guess I can't comment on Gray-headed Chickadee, but when the fuck am I going to see one of those?

Where there is Geribirding, there will be finches of some kind. Because Virginia Lakes is so damn high, Cassin's Finch was the only finch on the menu while we were there.

Living in Oakland the past few years, I don't get into high country often enough, so Cassin's Finches are still fun to look at...familiarity breeds contempt and all that. Note the classic streaking on the undertail coverts.

Take a gander at the length of those primaries...that is a bird built for wandering. You wouldn't want to get into a dispersing contest with a Cassin's Finch.

Clark's Nutcrackers were raging...I'm not sure if I'd seen so many at once before. It looked like whole family groups were coming in to eat peanuts.

Nutcrackers, as some of you know, are vital to the health of whitebark pine forests. It's not often you see a bird that essentially manages the forest you are standing in.

Judging by the short bill, this is a hatch year bird. It looks like there are a bunch of very fresh tertials growing in as well.

While Virginia Lakes is always dependable for nutcrackers, birders come here for another reason...Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch. There is no better place in the state to see them in the summer without burning a few thousand calories in the process, which is very unappealing to most birders.

The Rosy-finches finally came in to the resort's feeder after almost two hours of waiting, and promptly got down to the business of gorging. It's not the most "natural" setting, but rosy-finches are crippling birds and they are damn hard to get to (at least in this state) so I'm not going to complain if they want to frolic in a pile of seed right in front of me.

Why there are so few pink-feathered birds is unbeknownst to me. It's a very fetching color on birds, especially passerines. Rosies are just killing it with the pink-black-gray-chocolate brown combo.

Speaking of combos, here is a Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch-Least Chipmunk combo. Of all the avian and mammalian visitors to this Geribirding oasis, rosy-finches are probably the least wary of humans. It warmed my small, shriveled nerd-heart to see these creatures close up once again...so much so that I am going to Colorado this month just to look at Brown-capped Rosy-Finches to keep that rosy flame burning. Well that is not the only reason, but it would be a damn fine year bird, no doubt about that. If I had a dollar for every day I've seen Brown-capped Rosy-Finch, I would have...one dollar.

I would prefer to have two.

The One Bird Theory

Prothonotary Warblers are great...I was more than happy to see this one in Goleta, in Santa Barbara County, last fall on the way to visit friends/family/birds in Ventura. In 2015, eBird has records for Prothonotary Warblers from 10 different locations in California. Could this just be the same bird wandering around? Of course not, but birding is rife with empty questions like this.

According to The Great Ornithologist Felonious Jive, there are more birders now than ever. I am inclined to agree with him. Birders are birding harder than ever before. Birds, in much of the country, are really getting birded.  Perhaps as a result of increasing coverage over the years, I am constantly hearing the same thing...the one bird theory.

The one bird theory is simple, though a bit cumbersome to explain. If a Ruff is seen in Oregon one day, and another Ruff is seen in Washington a few days later, birders will wonder if it is the same bird. If a Common Crane is seen in New Mexico, and a Common Crane is seen in Texas a few days later, birders will wonder if it is the same bird. If an Emperor Goose is seen in Humboldt County one day and an Emperor Goose is seen in Sonoma County the next day, birders will wonder if it is the same bird. So rather than assuming or deducing two different individuals are involved, a birder will wonder (and that is the key word here) if the same individual has been found in both places.

Now some of you might think they know where I am going, that I think the one bird theory has nothing to it. That is not true. The one bird theory turns out to be correct quite often. What does bother me is how often I hear or read the phrase, "I wonder if the [Species Blablabla] seen at [Location A] is the same bird that was found at [Location B]." It is usually just left at that, without any discussion. Well friends, you don't have to just put your wonderment out there for the world to behold, you can actually have an informed opinion...you could even decide yourself!

But how can one do this? Why think when one can wonder? Examining the one bird theory is not so difficult, it just comes down to considering a few factors and asking a few questions.

Elegant Terns are obvious birds...you know when they are around. It is important to know when birds are around, and when they are not.

Were they seen at the same time?

Overeager birders who quickly spout their one bird theory hypothesis often don't even check to see if the different individual sightings involved were actually happening simultaneously. A bird can only be in one place at a time, not two. Do your research people, don't make others do it just to answer your own question.

Migratory habits of many North American species are well understood. Black Terns go south in winter, north in spring. Not too complicated.

What direction is it going?

This question is especially important to consider during migration. Let's revisit our Ruff example from above. Let's say the sighting happens in October. In October, shorebirds migrate south. If a Ruff is seen in Oregon, it is incredibly unlikely it will turn around during the height of fall migration and show up in Washington. The Ruff will not suddenly figure out it is in Coos Bay and then try to hightail it back to Siberia in order to find the correct continent before it continued its southward migration. So, keep migration and dispersal patterns in mind when pondering the one bird theory.

Cassin's Finches, like several other high elevation species, periodically "invade" unusual places every few years in search of food, which can take them to unusual habitats and places where one would not expect them. When such patterns are evident, one need not spend much time contemplating the one bird theory.

Is there a pattern?

For various reasons (often unexplained), a region will occasionally experience an irruption of a vagrant species, such as with Black-bellied Whistling-Ducks, seabirds and northern finches. So when a lot of Common Ground-Doves sightings are popping up in the Midwest, which happened last year, there is obviously no reason to think it is just the same bird miraculously choosing to stop in heavily-birded vagrant traps and being found repeatedly.

An out of range Western Gull would be a worthy candidate of the one bird theory. They are not highly prone to vagrancy, and would stand out in a lot of places. A bird wandering around the east or the interior west could definitely be found in more than one place.

How rare is it?

There are rare birds, and then there are rare birds. If two Golden-cheeked Warblers were seen in two different places in California in one year, one should rightly consider if the same individual is involved...it is just incredibly unlikely one would get here in the first place (and we do have a record!), let alone two around the same time. However, if two Chestnut-sided Warblers show up in different places in California in the same season, the idea of them being the same individual would be a ridiculous notion unless both birds were melanistic or banded or something like that (we will get to that soon). Chestnut-sided Warblers are not at all unexpected in California, and the state gets many records every year, up and down the state. It's quite rare for the one bird theory to be in effect when a "expected" species is involved.

In the eastern United States, there is no shortage of habitat a wayward Western Tanager could use spring through fall. How many Western Tanagers are eastern birders missing? Probably hella.

Think about birder coverage.

In most, not all, parts of the country, birders are not covering all available habitat very well. Most is inaccessible, due to lack of birders, roads, trails, or because land is private or government property that the public can't get to. When this is the case, think about all the area where birds are being missed...what are the chances that the subject of your one bird theory will somehow be found in more than one place, and somehow not vanish into the abyss that is all this other unbirded habitat? Think about the odds...they usually are not very good.

Ah, the Common Nighthawk. An easy bird to see in some places, but how many of the Common Nighthawks out there are people really seeing? Nightjars are hard...they can be hard to identify, but just finding them is typically the problem. Finding them roosting is blind luck, and birders can't see them foraging in the dark. The unfortunate truth is that the vast majority of nightjars go completely undetected in their normal range, let alone as vagrants! 

Think about detectability.

Some birds are easier to see than others. An Ivory Gull is easy to see. A Common Poorwill is not. A Ferruginous Hawk is easy to see. A Gray-cheeked Thrush is not. A Long-billed Curlew is easy to see. A Wilson's Snipe is not. A Black Skimmer is easy to identify. A Common Sandpiper is not. A Laysan Albatross is easy to pick out. A Tristram's Storm-Petrel is not. When birds are hard to find due to their habits or simply hard to identify, you can bet that a lot of these birds are going undetected, even when they are right in front of us! Then there is the fact that most birds in our area go undetected because they are in places where we don't bird, or because they fly right over us during migration...when birds migrate, they don't stop in every single county on their way to their destination. Think about this: a Yellow Rail seen in one place is practically guaranteed to never be seen in another. So to put it all together, one must ask how many of a certain species we are missing in a certain area. This has everything to do with likelihood of the one bird theory holding up for a vagrant. Keep these things in mind when the one bird theory is wracking your brain...the more you think about the detectability of a species, the more the one bird theory has a tendency to lose water.

This Pink-footed Shearwater is a good example of what a bird can offer that would help identify it on an individual level. This bird has a lot of molt going on in the flight feathers, definitely something to key in on, and the underwing pattern is a great thing to examine as well.

What does it look like?

I saved the one of the most obvious things to consider for last. These days, many rarities are photographed well. So before you put your public wonderment out there, see if you can compare photos of the bird(s) in question. You can compare age, plumage, sex, molt, wear, patterning, bands, etc. This is what typically provides a definitive answer when questioning if the same bird is involved.

And there you have it...it boils down to knowing status and distribution, what the birds look like, and some focused questions about the odds of the same bird being found twice versus the odds of a different individual being involved. The one bird theory will always be out there, and for good reason, but now you are equipped to test it. You are ready. Wield the hammer of this knowledge in listservs, forums and Facebook groups, and you too can make birders better.

Sierra Bravo In The Sierras

The state list is often an important list, when you have been birding for a long time.  After it becomes difficult to get lifers on a regular basis without travelling absurd distances, the birder begins to realize the beauty of pursuing lists other than the all-important List of Life. It is another shot in the arm, a reminder to seek birds besides those that one has never seen. And so, the state list often becomes the second-tier list, a worthy list...even a source of pride for many people (how embarrassing). In many ways, I am no different than the average birder, although I am much better at finding and identifying birds (#7, hello).  I keep a state list.  My state list is very important to me. It's so important that I have seen most birds that regularly occur in the state, which is hella. It's hard to get state birds now, which is why I now squeeze joy out of life by seeing county birds.  I know...how embarrassing...

But county birding is not why we are here...sorry to disappoint you nerds. When I was approached by one Amy Patten to make a quick, two day run to the Eastiern Sierra, I jumped at the chance. The Eastern Sierra is a special place, and I have a long and twisted history with the place known as Lee Vining. I am forced to keep going back, though it typically results in hangovers, and usually much yelling.  And although I'm sure you would like to hear more about the Yelling Club, that is not what I thought of when this opportunity came to be.

I thought of rosy-finches.

Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch has been the low-hanging, visually delicious fruit that I have been eyeing for years now. And by low-hanging, I mean they hang over 9,000 feet for a good piece of the year. In California, rosy-finches do not live where people live, so one must travel far (and wide) to seek them out. It turns out there are exactly two (2) places in the state where you can find a rosy-finch, with great ease, without having to embark on a high-elevation death march...or in my case, more like a wheezing walk that is a grim reminder of how out of shape I am and an all too real glimpse of my own mortality.

So after a night of drinking next to Lee Vining Creek, talking baseball with the Grub, and getting shitty morning coffee in Lee Vinging, it was up to Virginia Lakes for rosy-finching. The rosy-finches were mellow, despite their outward brilliance (look at those hot pink wings!).  Lounging on the deck of the store of the Virginia Lakes Resort, it was just a brief wait before this crippling beast came in for seed gobbling. The proprietors of the resort feed birds with reckless abandon, and a few rosy-finches come down from rocky slopes to gorge themselves on the regular.  The lady behind this operation told us that one in particular waits for her outside the door early every morning "and hovers around like a [goddamn] harrier" before she can even get the seed out, which appeared to be somewhat true...when someone came out on the porch where the seed was, instead of flying away sometimes this bird would just hover a few feet away and wait for the person to go back inside. So if you need an easy rosy-finch and enjoy some good geri birding, head up to Virginia Lakes.

For the first time since the Common Scoter, my state list has grown even more swollen and bloated. Sierra bravo! New Lower 48 bird! Lifer subspecies! Great success!

Rosy-finches weren't the only things taking advantage of the seed bonanza. Cassin's Finches were one of the most common birds there, which I was pretty stoked on. I've never seen so many so close before, and I have now rectified my chronic problem of not crushing Cassin's Finches. The cycle has been broken, and the Cassin's Finch has been crushed.  This is a juvenile, you can still see a few wisps of down on its crown.

Here is a male.  The lighting was kinda gnarly, but I'm pretty happy how geri photo sesh went considering I was baptizing a new lens.

It was really nice to be surrounded by Finches of Cassin, instead of Finches of House for a change. It was also cool to get blasted by a variety of Cassin's Finch vocalizations, since these days I get to hear them even more rarely I get to see them it seems. Getting rust on one's birding by ear skills is not something that I encourage, and I recommend avoiding it at all costs.

Hello White-crowned Sparrow.  But you are not just any White-crowned Sparrow, no...you are not nuttalli, our coastal resident, nor are you of our other relatively common California subspecies, gambelii or pugentensis.  You breed in the Sierras, your bill is pink, and lord have mercy, your lores are black. Black as midnight on a moonless night, if you want to get scientific about it. This is oriantha, a bird of deserts and mountains, a White-crowned Sparrow that thinks making babies at 9,770 feet (the elevation of Virginia Lakes Resort) is a perfectly reasonable thing to do.

Here is a juvenile oriantha, a life plumage for me. Just look at those broad, dark lores...weird.

Damn, take a gander on the bill length of this White-breasted Nuthatch. It's obscene, and I am still struggling to come to grips with it.  This is a member of the Rocky Mountain subspecies (subspecies group?), which sounds absolutely nothing like WBNU in most of California. They have a very narrow range in the state; on the weekend we had them here at Virginia Lakes and further south in Lee Vining Canyon.

For your edification: beneath all the birdlife was a writhing swarm of jiggling Belding's Ground Squirrels.

A walk around part of Saddlebag Lake was not particularly birdy, but had a major highlight in this Pika. A Pika! I've never seen one in California before, and actually pished this one up. That branch to the right is destined to become part of its larder, but with all the greenery the Pika had scattered around on the rocks it didn't look like it was in a hurry to get organized.

Some birds don't like feeders.  Some birds are hard to geri bird. Green-tailed Towhee is one such bird, and is another species I was happy to add to the old year list over the weekend.  Their mellow songs and mild disdain for people brings back many memories of birding Mount Pinos when I was a kid...when lifers were easy to come by, I misidentified birds more often, and I couldn't fucking drive.

And here is a somehat-unsure-of-itself juvenile/fledgling that was following the above adult around. Like the young White-crowned Sparrow above, this bird won't wear this plumage for very long. This also reminds me of being a teenage birder, but for complicated and mostly embarrassing reasons.

Unlike month-old towhees, lilies are very sure of themselves. This is a Sierra Tiger Lily, growing next to a stream at Virginia Lakes.  It is a small lily, modest in size, but big on facemelt. Thanks botany girls for the ID.

Here's a Mariposa lily, I forget what kind, it real pretty though.  A state rich in Calorchortus is a rich state indeed...not sure if I've seen this one before, it was up at Saddlebag Lake.

I'm not a butterfly nerd, but since some of you are here is some kind of copper to gawk at.

The mighty Clark's Nutcracker can be heard bellowing the pines on distant slopes. It is one of the quintessential sounds of the mountains. These birds are one of the most interesting species (bizarrely accurate recall abilities, ties to whitebark pine, etc)  that reside in high elevations, and thankfully they usually aren't very difficult to find. Oh, my friend Jill saw one swallow a Junco fledgling the other day, so they do that too.

The rarest thing we saw over the weekend was a marriage proposal. That is when I learned that proposing in public with all your friends (there were a bunch more dudes lurking out of the frame) awkwardly watching from extremely close range is a thing now. We were actually geri birding when we saw this...geri birding is so good.