The Birds of Chavarrillo

Every once in a while, I think people need to be disturbed. This is the one-eyed turkey that lived next door to us in Chavarrillo. It actually had more room to run around than this picture makes it seem, but the turkey was continually having the shit kicked out of it by the yard rooster and the hen turkey (I assume this is why his eye is gone), so often he took to taking shelter in this nook. What's even more complicated is that the hen would occasionally let old Tom here mate with her, which makes things awfully complicated. Talk about an abusive relationship. It was very strange to see Tom strutting around, all proudly puffed-up with wings dragging, only to be fleeing his prospective mate in terror a few moments later. Anyways, if you keep any birds, for my sake don't litter their feeding areas with garbage, its just not classy. Watching Muscovy Ducks hungrily eating plastic is not my idea of fun.

But we are not here to talk about abused turkeys or deranged ducks today. I am posting my Chavarrillo bird list, so anyone going to work at Swainson's Hawk Bird Observatory in the future will know what to expect, and to try to motivate some non-Mexican birders to find their way there. It's not really in taxanomic order and I might have some names wrong, but I think its complete. Birds in bold were new for me. All photos were taken in or adjacent to Chavarrillo.

Least Grebe
American White Pelican
Neotropic Cormorant
Anhinga
Great Egret
Little Blue Heron
Tricolored Heron
Cattle Egret
Black-crowned Night-Heron
Wood Stork
Black Vulture
Turkey Vulture
Grey-necked Wood-Rail
Osprey
Mississippi Kite
Swallow-tailed Kite
Hook-billed Kite
Northern Harrier
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Cooper's Hawk
Gray Hawk
Red-tailed Hawk
Swainson's Hawk

Broad-winged Hawk (pictured above)
Zone-tailed Hawk
Roadside Hawk
Common Black-Hawk
Short-tailed Hawk
Crested Caracara
Bat Falcon
Merlin
American Kestrel
Peregrine Falcon
Plain Chachalaca
Northern Jacana
Solitary Sandpiper
White-tipped Dove
White-winged Dove
Eurasian Collared-Dove
Inca Dove
Ruddy Ground-Dove
Red-billed Pigeon
Rock Pigeon
White-crowned Parrot
Red-lored Parrot

Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl (pictured above)
Vermiculated Screech-Owl (heard only)
Mottled Owl (heard only)
Tawny-colored Nightjar
Vaux's Swift (it is possible Chimneys were observed as well)
Greater Swallow-tailed Swift
White-collared Swift
Golden-olive Woodpecker (conspecific with Bronze-winged Woodpecker now, right?)
Smoky-brown Woodpecker
Golden-fronted Woodpecker
Lineated Woodpecker
Ivory-billed Woodcreeper
Ringed Kingfisher
Green Kingfisher
Little Hermit (again...anybody know the current taxonomy on this species?)
Wedge-tailed Sabrewing
Azure-crowned Hummingbird
Green-breasted Mango
Green Violet-Ear
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Canevet's Emerald
Broad-billed Hummingbird
Buff-bellied Hummingbird
Squirrel Cuckoo
Groove-billed Ani
Keel-billed Toucan
Gartered Trogon
Blue-crowned Motmot
Barn Swallow
Cliff Swallow

Northern Rough-winged Swallow (pictured above)
Dusky-capped Flycatcher
Dusky Flycatcher
Least Flycatcher
Yellow-bellied Flycatcher
Western Wood-Pewee
Greenish Elaenia
Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet
Eastern Phoebe
Vermilion Flycatcher
Scissor-tailed Flycatcher
Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher
Boat-billed Flycatcher
Great Kiskadee
Social Flycatcher
Couch's Kingbird
Tropical Kingbird
Western Kingbird

Masked Tityra (pictured above)
Yellow-green Vireo
Warbling Vireo
Blue-headed Vireo
White-eyed Vireo
Barred Antshrike
Rufous-browed Peppershrike
Brown Jay
Green Jay
Black-crested Titmouse
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Rufous-naped Wren
Band-backed Wren
Spot-breasted Wren
House Wren
White-bellied Wren
Clay-colored Thrush/Robin
White-throated Thrush/Robin

Long-billed Thrasher (pictured above)
Blue Mockingbird
Gray Catbird
Blue-grey Gnatcatcher
Red-legged Honeycreeper
Greyish Saltator
Black-headed Saltator
Rose-throated Becard
Blue-winged Warbler
Orange-crowned Warbler
Nashville Warbler
Yellow Warbler
Tropical Parula
Northern Parula
Magnolia Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Worm-eating Warbler
Ovenbird
American Redstart
Black-and-white Warbler
Black-throated Green Warbler
MacGillivray's Warbler
Wilson's Warbler
Rufous-capped Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
Grey-crowned Yellowthroat
Slate-throated Redstart
Yellow-breasted Chat
Northern Cardinal
Crimson-collared Grosbeak
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Indigo Bunting
Varied Bunting

Painted Bunting (above, with a Green Heron. Weird mixed flock.)
Western Tanager
Summer Tananger
Yellow-winged Tanager
Blue-grey Tanager
Lincoln's Sparrow
Rusty Sparrow
Scrub Euphonia
Yellow-throated Euphonia
Great-tailed Grackle
Bronzed Cowbird
Melodious Blackbird
Orchard Oriole
Baltimore Oriole
Audubon's Oriole
Altamira Oriole

Montezuma Oropendula (pictured above)
Yellow-billed Cacique
Yellow-faced Grassquit
Blue-black Grassquit
White-collared Seedeater
House Finch
Lesser Goldfinch
House Sparrow

167 species, almost all within walking distance from the observatory! Pretty snazzy. For the record, this was from February 24 thru April 28, 2011. Someone who has more free time in the future could easily rack up some more.

Other observers also recorded Yellow-headed Parrot, Black Swift, White-bellied Emerald, Northern Bentbill and Red-crowned Ant-Tanager, among others.

I promise, whether you like it or not, more Mexican content in the near future. I will also officially announce that I am settled here in North Dakota and I seem to have internet access, so it will be a long, bloggy summer. Tomorrow is my first day of paid work since September 30. Sick.

I'm Intercontinental When I Eat French Toast

Some nights big flocks of Swainson's Hawks and Broad-winged Hawks come in to spend the night on the hill above town. As with all the pics here, double click to enlarge the specks.

April 23, 2011.

Five more days.

By the time you are reading this, I will probably be back in the virtual arms of the internet, being cradled by the collective lot of you. You will once again have more than one blog post a week, which I know you must have. No more will your nightmares revolve around the scarcity of photos on BB&B and weird formatting issues that I can’t seem to lose. Expect another interview and some new installments of Birders As Art. The Human Birdwatcher Project will once again rise from the ashes like a socially inept Phoenix, and BB&B will continue on its near-vertical trajectory of becoming the best bird blog. Of course, some would contend that it already is, and to you I say you are Right. But I must spread the word. The blogetite for BB&B is very strong, I know.

I hope you’ve all been birding much.

Besides vultures and birds of prey, other migrants like Anhingas, Wood Storks and these American White Pelicans can be seen flying over Chavarrillo as well.

Carlos is a master bird mimic. This is on top of the pigeon shuffle (which, not jokingly, I believe he does next to people as a territorial display), that all of you should be familiar with. The other mainstay is the rooster crow, which is incredibly annoying when he does it early in the morning in a confined space. Then there is the pigeon/chicken peck, which is how he occasionally eats his food. Yesterday I caught him doing what has to be a Melodious Blackbird song, at the top of his lungs. This is relatively easy to do if you haven’t hit puberty yet. He also displays some strange cat-like tendencies, such as mewing, hissing, lapping water from a wide, shallow bowl, and attempting to catch flies with his mouth.

The day before I leave Mexico I’ll be on the coast south of Veracruz, birding viciously. I haven’t seen the ocean since I flew down here in February and it will be cool to check out a new place. And its avifauna. Obviously. There are rumors of Thick-knees, Fork-tailed Flycatchers and Pinnated Bitterns there. Jesus! Tears are coming to my eyes just thinking about it.

Veracruz state is blessed with a strange mix of birds from both eastern and western North America, like this MacGillivray's Warbler. He is probably sulking about not skulking in this photo.

Standard counting swag. Coffee, data sheet, clickers (for Turkey Vulture, Swainson's Hawk, Broad-winged Hawk and Mississippi Kite, respectively), field notebook, ipod, nerd.

I highly recommend people come down to bird Veracruz state, if they get the chance. The quantity and diversity of birds here is amazing, and I wish I would have had the chance to experience more of it. In the spring, there is the raptor migration here in Chavarrillo to check out, and of course there is the River Of Raptors in the fall. There are coastal mangrove forests, marshes, rainforest, thorn forest, high elevation coniferous forest, and everything inbetween. Robert Straub, bird guru of Veracruz, has a great book on birding sites throughout the state that would be crucial to get your hands on.

The drug war seems like it’s only a rumor from where I stand here, but of course I know from personal experience it is all too real to the north…at any rate the risk of another Tamaulipas Incident here seems quite low. Let’s hope it stays that way.

Montezuma's Oropendulas are common around town. They are huge and ridiculous.

There is a big party building up in the plaza here for Semanas Santos. The godawful loudspeaker tower that is lashed to the roof of a neighboring house has been playing ridiculous music on a loop all morning. The chorus of one song is “I see. I know. Meow meow meow meow.”, followed by a synthesizer making cat-like mew sounds. The rest of the song is in Spanish. Pretty great.

The internet has been elusive for quite some time now. The only place in Chavarrillo with internet has been closed, and a journey to another town specifically for emailing also ended in failure. I must communicate. I guess its back to searching the sky until then.

A Single Flourish Of His Tail

Sharp-shinned Hawks are common migrants here, frequently terrifying songbirds in the local neighborhood on their way North.

Sunday, March 27. The iconic Mexican sun is really living up to its reputation today…it is relentless. We are a rocking a 100% shadeless bird observatory (partially because the tarp that’s available fills my heart with hate, partially because you see a lot more birds when you can look straight up without obstructions), and the withering sun is causing the mind to wander…..what, exactly, does it take to die from exposure? What am I doing here, in this god forsaken place? When will I wake up?

Melodious Blackbird!

Not only is El Sol a source of physical discomfort for the hawk counter, it can cause great mental anguish as well. On most cloudless days it seems the big migrant flocks either choose different routes to take, or they fly so high that it can be impossible to spot them against a bright, big blue sky. Today seems to be a big exception. While its still morning here, I think we may already have our biggest flight day of the spring (15,600 was the previous high)….with over 8,000 Turkey Vultures cruising northward in the last hour alone, we should have a nice, fat total of TVs, Swainson’s Hawks and Broad-winged Hawks at the end of the day. Other birds going north include a Hook-billed Kite, a trio of Common Black-Hawks, a few Ospreys…..

Counting hawks is strange. It involves no physical activity whatsoever. That is pretty great for slothful people like me, but it also aggravates my mild (self-diagnosed) ADD. Ten and a half hours of counting….day after day….hours of boredom punctuated by massive, fast-moving flocks of raptors that come fast and low over the surrounding hills, as if to take us by surprise…it frays the nerves.

The glorious tower. Where I spend all day, every day.

Another thing that doesn’t help the situation is that one of the dudes I’m working with is a really good birder and is going out every day to the edge of town to band passerines, often finding birds that I have yet to see (Yellow-headed Parrots, Barred Antshrikes, White-bellied Emeralds, etc). I fiend for these birds….I am a junkie, after all. You don’t become Number 8 in the nation without powerful feelings for seeing as many birds as possible, at all times, at all costs.

Ok. Time to write some love letters. Keep your heads up, people.

Same Cars Same Clothes Same Desires Same Woes

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