The trails I hike with dog each morning—through scrub oak habitat in the foothill trails east of Salt Lake City—are crawling with Spotted Towhees. In high season, only Lazuli Buntings outnumber towhees (in my estimation), but the buntings are long gone. Plenty of towhees remain.
I feel sure many (most?) migrate away, whereas surely some stick around all year. But lately I’ve counted nine or ten towhees per hike, at least, and often quite a bit more. (E.g., this morning I counted eleven—which I believe to be an undercount, judging by all the scratching in the leaves I heard.) Yet when I list more than ten individuals at eBird, I get an alert to the effect of, “Yo, that seems like an awful lot of birds up there at this time of year!”
Well, folks, just tag along and see for yourself. This here’s towhee country.
Grandeur Peak Area List
Beginning at 9:08 a.m., I hiked a few hundred feet up a mountain.
1. Dark-eyed Junco
2. House Finch*
3. Woodhouse’s Scrub-jay**
4. Spotted Towhee
5. Northern Flicker**
6. Black-capped Chickadee
7. American Robin
8. Pine Siskin
9. Downy Woodpecker
(v) Voice only
*Also elsewhere
**Voice only elsewhere
Mammals
Red Squirrel
Tags: American robin, black-capped chickadee, dark-eyed junco, downy woodpecker, house finch, northern flicker, pine siskin, red squirrel, spotted towhee, Woodhouse’s scrub jay
