A lovely hike with dog this clear, birdy morning. Before we’d barely left the switchback, in fact, I had more than a dozen species on my list—including a strange, unexpected bird perched in the big Russian olive tree.
A huge-beaked bird it was, but no Black-headed Grosbeak. Every several seconds it emitted a single bright note, a call I didn’t recognize. Had to be another grosbeak, but which could it be? Not until we got back home and I searched the Cornell Lab site for Utah grosbeaks did I realize what I’d seen: an Evening Grosbeak, a female or immature male.
. Every several seconds it emitted a single bright note, a call I didn’t recognize. Had to be another grosbeak, but which could it be? Not until we got back home and I searched the Cornell Lab site for Utah grosbeaks did I realize what I’d seen: an Evening Grosbeak, a female or immature male.
Decades ago, back in Maine, great flocks of Evening Grosbeaks descended during winter irruptions, and I got to know them very well. And then one year they didn’t return, and I hadn’t seen one since. Not in a span of at least 30 years—and never, I think, a solo individual.
Good to see you, great-beaked bird. I hope you find more of your kind.
Grandeur Peak Area List Beginning at 7:05 a.m. (8:05 MDT), I hiked a few hundred feet up a mountain.
Good news and not so bad news this morning: Jack seems fine and was eager to hike this morning; not nearly the excitement of yesterday, bird-wise, but still an enjoyable excursion.
Cooler, breezier, mostly clear. The Rock Wrens are still in the little old quarry, so maybe they’ll nest there this year. Gnatcatchers all over the place, with those antic, highly entertaining songs and calls of theirs. The usual spring warblers, Warbling Vireos, chippies, a Cooper’s Hawk.
Dog really dug our hike, and so did I.
Grandeur Peak Area List Beginning at 7:05 a.m. (8:05 MDT), I hiked a few hundred feet up a mountain.
Good and bad news this morning. The bad news first: Jack didn’t want to go. He’s had a couple episodes the past few days (stick lodged in throat, finally swallowed, and a missed jump into the truck after a hike, causing a minor fall), and he’s been a little lethargic since, so we have a vet appointment on Monday—although yesterday he was fine on the trails. Still, I figured he could use a day off (first since October 2019).
So although I thought about him the whole way, I ended up doing a ridge hike—a long, slow walk uphill a good ways, then downhill again, all the while observing a whole heap of migrating birds.
