Category: Birds

Humility

A cactus wren holds a twig in its mouth as it builds a nest in the arms of a saguaro at the Brown's Ranch Trailhead in McDowell Sonoran Preserve in Scottsdale, Arizona

On April 28th I arrived at my first visit to Brown’s Ranch in McDowell Sonoran Preserve, my fifth hike and fourth hiking location since moving to Arizona a month prior. I was pleased that even though I arrived mentally and physically exhausted I was forcing myself to go out and explore some area parks, even though it meant getting up a while before sunrise. As soon as I stepped past the welcome center I was reminded that while I should be proud of all I had accomplished the past six months, my struggles had been minor compared to what many face every day. There in the arms of a saguaro, the light just cresting the distant hills, stood a cactus wren with a twig in its mouth, building a nest in such a seemingly inhospitable host in a seemingly inhospitable land. Brown’s Ranch became an immediate favorite as did the plucky wrens that in the coming weeks I got to watch not just build their nests but raise their families in them.

Shrike One! Shrike Two!

A loggerhead shrike perches in a tree along an off-map trail near Granite Mountain in McDowell Sonoran Preserve in Scottsdale, Arizona

When I saw this loggerhead shrike on an off-map trail near Granite Mountain I assumed it was my first one in Arizona but not my first one ever, having seen them in Washington. Except I hadn’t, when I got home and checked my notes I realized the shrikes in Washington were northern shrikes so this was both my second shrike and a new species for me. In my defense I rarely saw shrikes there or here.

Soft and Sharp

A white-winged dove pauses as it feeds on the fruits of a saguaro in the soft early light of a summer morning along the Latigo Trail in McDowell Sonoran Preserve

The sun was up and shining on the tops of the saguaros but when this white-winged dove dropped down to feed on the fruit on a lower arm I was able to photograph it in the soft reflected light. The full sun arrived seconds later. Taken on July 4th while the saguaro were fruiting and the white-wings still flew above the desert.

Moths For Breakfast Again? That’s It, I’m Leaving!

A female Gila woodpecker brings a moth to the nest in an old saguaro as the male prepares to leave near an Off-map Trail in McDowell Sonoran Preserve

A female Gila woodpecker brings a moth to the nest as the male prepares to leave (the moth was for the hungry babies inside). The parents brought a variety of insects (and spiders, as she has in her beak below) to their nest in the old saguaro. The male seemed to spend more time in the nest and the female more time hunting during the mornings I watched them. It required a bit of a hike to get to the nest so I couldn’t get there right at first light but it was a treat to watch them nevertheless. I will always be amazed by the relentless energy parents spend getting their babies past those precarious early days.

I also have a 4K clip of them at the nest which I’ll learn to edit at some point and post here. Both pictures are from this spring after we had been in Arizona for about six weeks.

A female Gila woodpecker brings a spider to the nest in an old saguaro as the male prepares to leave near an Off-map Trail in McDowell Sonoran Preserve

Up & Up & Up

An American bittern stands with its next stretched out against a backdrop of green grasses at Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge in Washington

Bitterns can look like a football with a head attached so it always amazed me when they’d stand and stretch their necks up, and up, and up. Useful for seeing over tall grasses and also as a defensive pose, I saw them do it multiple times when bald eagles soared high overhead, although the subterfuge worked best when the grasses were brown instead of green. I was never quite sure how they distinguished the distant eagles from other birds of prey but I did a quick check of the skies if a bittern I had been watching suddenly struck a thin vertical pose.