Backyard Bird List Up to 20 Species

Are you taking Desert Survivor's Backyard Bird Challenge? How many bird species have you seen in your backyard?

A friend asked me how many we have, and I realized we are up to 20 species already! Our list is over in the sidebar to the right, and also below (because that's what will print out when we print our blog book):

1. European starling (1/1/2015)

2. Dark-eyed junco (1/1/2015)

3. Black-billed magpie (1/2/2015)

4. Eurasian collared dove (1/5/2015)

5. House finch (1/5/15)

6. Canada goose (1/5/15)

7. Great horned owl (1/6/15)

8. Northern flicker (1/9/15)

9. American goldfinch (1/11/15)

10. Mallard (1/11/15)

11. Chickens (1/11/15)

12. Red-tailed hawk (1/9/15)

13. Common raven (1/14/15)

14. American Robin (1/24/15)

15. Red-winged Blackbird (1/26/15)

16. Northern harrier (1/27/15)

17. Killdeer (2/13/15)

18. Western meadowlark (2/13/15)

19. White-crowned sparrow (2/13/15)

20. Sandhill crane (2/22/15)

Don't you just love #11? The kids insisted we add that. 

I was very excited to hear the killdeer (photo above) and sandhill cranes, as they were gone for part of the winter. The meadowlarks are already singing their mating songs. Some birds we had in the yard last year but haven't seen yet this year are Cassin's finches and pinyon jays. I think with the really warm winter they have stayed up higher on the mountain.

Desert Girl is getting very good at some of the most common birds we see, like dark-eyed juncos and black-billed magpies. The next few months will be a lot of fun as the list grows quickly. Will we make it to 50 species this year? I've got my fingers crossed!

St. George Bird Festival 2015

 In 2013 we went to the St. George Bird Festival and enjoyed it so much that we went back this year. I had signed up for a photography birding trip on Friday, but when I woke up it was raining and I wasn't feeling well and decided I better not go or I would be sick even longer. Fortunately, the next day I was feeling better so the kids and I went on a short birding trip to Springs Park. We were greeted by birds running towards us, hoping to get fed.

We had a big group of all abilities, and we took our time walking around the pond.

The kids were enthralled with the swans. I have to admit I was too, even though they are Mute Swans and not native. They still are really beautiful.

We also saw pied-billed grebes, mallards, spotted towhees, Abert's towhee, white-crowned sparrows, a snow goose, a road runner, and much more. For me the highlight was this Crissal Thrasher, a new species for my life list.

It was nice going with a trip leader who knew not only about the birds of the area, but also the efforts to conserve them.

The kids weren't too excited about the talking, so they ran ahead and found this nice swing with a great view of the pond and birds.

We watched an American coot come up close and really got to observe its interesting feet.

A little later we went back to the Tonaquint Nature Center for the junior birding program. I think Desert Boy was surprised how much he already knew about birds.


Right outside the nature center the sun came out and lit up this mallard.

We also saw hooded mergansers, bufflehead, a belted kingerfisher, two mute swans, and this ring-necked duck on the pond.

The kids really enjoyed seeing a peacock on the grounds. Then we went over to a pavilion where Home Depot was sponsoring a project to make bird feeders. The kids were delighted to use hammers.

The finished project! We look forward to using them.

Later we went to a program about owls and got to see an owl close up. It was really neat (even though I didn't get a good photo!)

I think one of the reasons I enjoy the St. George Bird Festival so much is that it's in the middle of winter, but St. George is quite warm, so it doesn't seem like winter. I also like seeing birds that I don't usually get to see. We plan to return!

Backyard Bird Challenge Check-In

Have you been seeing many birds in your backyard?

Our Backyard Bird Challenge is going well. We've been a lot more diligent lately about looking and have come up with a nice list--twelve so far! Only thirty eight to go. We're keeping a tally in the sidebar to the right. We haven't seen anything strange or exotic, but that's okay. And we're really trying to watch bird behavior of the birds we see over and over again. I've seen a few extra that we don't have on the list, as I really want the kids to see them before we add them.

An easy one to identify was the Great Horned Owl. The one in the photo above posed so nicely for a photo. Then it took off and flew across the yard. The chickens screamed (they had had a scare a couple weeks previously from a Great Horned Owl that we witnessed). I ran over, but saw the owl continue into the next yard. The rooster pecked at the ground, seemingly unconcerned, and one of the hens wandered. I didn't see the other hen, but didn't think much of it.

Until later, when my husband told me that he and Desert Boy had been out looking for a hen, as when Desert Boy closed the chicken coop, there was only the rooster and one hen.

I started wondering if the owl had killed the chicken, but hadn't flown off with it. And it was all my fault, because I had made the owl fly because I had gotten too close to take a photo. Of course, I didn't know what had really happened. Maybe skunks were back in the area. And there's been a mountain lion sighting not far from our house, so perhaps the lion had gotten a chicken (although our dog Henry hasn't been barking a lot, so that didn't seem too likely).

Losing any pets is not fun, and I was feeling a little verklempt. As we got ready to go this morning, I opened the garage door, and the hen ran out! What a great way to feel better! I sure do like a happy ending to the story.

Fish Springs National Wildlife Refuge Christmas Bird Count 2015

 Fish Springs National Wildlife Refuge needed some help with their Christmas Bird Count. I had helped a couple years ago and relished a chance to return to this very remote outpost (they have to drive an hour to get their mail; we had to drive two hours on dirt roads to get there). To sweeten the deal, we were offered lodging in their bunkhouse the night before and/or after the count.

The bunkhouse is fantastic.

Inside is a big living room with a huge TV, Dish, and, most important to Desert Boy, wifi.

The bunkhouse has four bedrooms, and as we were the first to arrive, I let the kids choose which room they wanted to stay in. Then they got to choose their beds, and they didn't hesitate to take the top bunk beds.

The kitchen area is great, with plenty of dishes and pots, which we used to make some soup.

Later other folks arrived and we had a lot of fun meeting them. Tiffany, the refuge biologist, came over to make sure we were situated. We slept well, and the next morning we got our assignments for the Christmas Bird Count. We were looking forward to seeing what bird species we would spot.

As we drove around the refuge, we found lots of American coots on a couple of the canals, but they were too far away to photograph. We flushed some northern pintails, and they quickly flew away, looking for other open water. Later we had a wonderful view of a loggerhead shrike.

We got out at the end of the road near Avocet pond and walked a bit, hoping to find some other birds. The boys were busy discussing Minecraft and Desert Girl had fun making strange footprints.

Many of the ponds were frozen over, with interesting patterns out on the ice.

Later we found a coot and a pied-billed grebe next to each other. It was nice of them to provide such a good comparison!

One highlight was seeing about 80 tundra swans out on the ice. Here's a view of them in front of the majestic Fish Springs Range.

We found two bald eagles in the trees by the historic Thomas Ranch. One was content to stay put and let us take photos.

After doing the mid-winter waterfowl count in the afternoon, Tiffany showed us a spot with a large number of black-crowned night herons. They are such cool birds!

They were hanging out near a springhead, where the water was too warm to freeze.

I had planned on going home that afternoon, but it was getting late and I was tired, so we decided to spend another night. Our new friend Shirley graciously offered to watch the kids so I could drive around and take some photos in the beautiful late-afternoon light. I found an American tree sparrow, which I hadn't seen earlier. It cooperated for photos.

Earlier we had noticed the tracks on the ice and were fascinated with them. The ones on the clear ice are raised.

The almost-full moon rose early and I figured it would be a good time to practice for the Full Moon Photography Challenge.

We enjoyed our second night at Fish Springs. I could easily spend a week there, the light is always changing and it is such a scenic place. We did some sightseeing on the way home, which I'll share on a future post.

2014 Christmas Bird Count and Desert Survivor's Backyard Bird Challenge Wrapup

I helped with the local Christmas Bird Count, and it turned out to be a beautiful day, albeit very windy in the afternoon.  I was pleasantly surprised to find some birds that haven't been seen for this count in over ten years, like the Evening Grosbeak, above. All the warm weather we've been having in early and mid December probably had a few bird species hanging around longer than usual.

The winter landscape was gorgeous.

And the warm weather meant that the lakes and streams weren't frozen over, so we saw lots of water birds. I counted over a thousand mallards.

I had a spotting scope so I could check each one. I found a couple mergansers and a couple green-winged teals hanging out with the mallards. Some mallards were floating out in the middle of the lake, but most were eating along the shoreline.

Another bird I had to test my counting skills with were the European starlings. There were hundreds, sometimes in huge flocks. Even though they are non-native so they aren't a bird I particularly like, I still marvel how they fly together and can change direction so quickly.

Christmas Bird Counts are still continuing in various locations until January 5. They are a lot of fun and a great way to learn about an area. I might do two more.

Since we're talking about birds, let's segue into Backyard Birds. Did you take my Backyard Bird Challenge? The challenge was to keep track of what birds you saw in your backyard throughout the year.

We did really well starting the challenge, but slowed down in May as my schedule got busier. I realized that we didn't spend as much time in the backyard as I had thought! We did keep a list, though, and here's the front page:

Desert Boy wrote some of our findings, which was a great way to get him involved. Plus his spelling puts a smile on my face (e.g., trky volcher).

But I needed a neat and tidy list, so I typed one up and put in boxes so we could check what months we were seeing what birds. It was a great idea, but by the end of summer we couldn't keep up.

So will we do the Backyard Bird Challenge in 2015? You betcha. And now we have a goal to beat: we saw 34 different bird species in our backyard in 2014. I'm sure we can do better in 2015. And hopefully with the kids getting older and being able to take more responsibility, we'll count for more of the year!

Pyramid Peak Hike, Great Basin National Park, Nevada

To recap from a previous post, my husband and I climbed Pyramid Peak in Great Basin National Park last weekend. We started about 8,100 ft to reach the 11,926 foot summit. We chose to gain that 3,800 ft (more than climbing Wheeler Peak) by hiking near Dead Lake, which I covered in this last post.

Then we wanted to head over to the main Johnson Lake trail. On the topo map it looks quite easy, and the terrain wasn't too hard, with Engelmann spruce trees and patches of manzanita, but it sure felt long.

Eventually we reached the trail, where the going was a little easier. The trail must have had quite a rainstorm recently, because quite a few sections had sizeable gullies in them.

I was so happy to reach the Johnson Mill Historic Site, where we took a welcome break.

Then it was the very steep section up to the historic cabins near Johnson Lake. Imagining what it was like to be a miner is always fun--and intimidating. That could not have been an easy life.

After a quick snack and swimming break at the lake (it was warmer than expected), we took the steep trail up to the ridge.

This is a trail bighorn sheep would like--very steep and rocky!

As we reached the ridge, Pyramid Peak didn't look so far away.

There's no trail up to the top of Pyramid Peak, so we just made our way up the talus slope. As it got steeper, the peak looked farther away.

We kept hiking and hiking.

Johnson Lake looked very small below, so we knew we were making progress.

I busied my mind by searching for the beautiful alpine wildflowers, like these alpine fleabane (Erigeron leiomerus) and Holmgren's buckwheat (Eriogonum holmgrenii). I especially like the buckwheat, which only grows on the Snake Range.

Finally we made it to the top and got a photo to prove it (there's no register like in past years). In the background is the backside of Wheeler and Jeff Davis peaks. This view makes it a little more understandable why some of the early explorers thought the peak was volcanic, since it does somewhat resemble a crater. However, the rock is in fact quartzite. (Nevertheless, over 20% of the Great Basin is volcanic, a fun fact you can learn about more in my new book The Great Basin for Kids, available in the sidebar.)

From the top of Pyramid Peak you can see a bit of Baker Lake. It looks very small and by late summer a lot of the water has evaporated from it.

 We saw bird on the peak that still stumps me. If you know it, please leave a note in the comments!

We also saw white butterflies chasing each other. They never landed so I couldn't get a photo of them, but this butterfly, I think a Great Basin Fritillary, did stop nearby.

I was also excited to see this Anise Swallowtail, my first viewing of this species.

Instead of going back the southwest ridge and retracing our steps by Johnson Lake, we decided to take the eastern ridge down, join the Shoshone Trail that goes over South Fork Baker Creek to the Johnson Lake trail, and then loop around. From the top it didn't look too bad (it never does, right?).

We saw some different plants on the eastern side, including this Purple-flowered Stonecrop (Rhodiola integrifolium). It contrasted nicely with the Erigeron.

 As we descended, I really liked the view of Wheeler and Jeff Davis Peaks with their cloud shadows through the saddle of Pyramid and False Pyramid Peaks. I've hiked that saddle once, a pleasant hike. But then we decided to go down and meet up with the Baker Lake trail--not a good idea, the slopes are so steep that when you set a rock rolling, it just keeps rolling and rolling.

The clouds were building, so we were going down as fast as we could, but the descent was hard on our knees (mine still hurt a week later). We are definitely in monsoon season, with frequent afternoon thunderstorms.

A rock wren flitted on the rock in front of us.

Eventually we entered the trees, and before long the forest was so overgrown we could no longer follow the ridge. We dropped down on the Snake Creek side, bushwhacking through all sorts of vegetation. My favorite were the aspen groves, as they provided some shade and were a little easier to travel through.

Finally we made it back to camp, about seven hours after taking off. It was eight miles in total, but with our heavy packs, I don't think we could have gone much faster. We soaked our sore feet in the cold creek.

We packed up our camp before it started raining hard and paused to take a slightly blurry family photo. Thanks so much to our family and friends who watched the kids while we did the training hike. The kids certainly had a lot more fun with their cousins than they would have on that hike!

So in summary, Pyramid Peak is a beautiful peak to climb. If you climb it from the ridge between Johnson and Baker peaks, it's not too hard, but it still is a lot of elevation gain. Bushwhacking, as usual, makes a hike more difficult. But it's kind of fun seeing the less-traveled parts of the world! So I guess even though I was sore and tired after the hike, I will be doing more hikes.