Our recent post on Montana’s famous Northern Hawk Owl generated an astonishing two million views . . . or was that, er, two hundred? Either way, that’s pretty good for us, but it did put us in a quandary over how to follow up. Our answer? Look for more owls!
But first, I promised you some other winter birds. As revealed in past posts, Braden and I have discovered that one of the best way to make sure we see certain winter birds is to go to Discovery—ski area, that is. This year, on the way back from seeing the Northern Hawk Owl, we detoured through Anaconda to see what we could find. Fate seemed to shine on us as we spotted a Golden Eagle just outside of Anaconda, but when we pulled into the crowded Discovery parking lot, we didn’t see a single bird. “Hm, that’s strange,” Braden murmured. “And we forgot to bring bird seed with us,” I added.
Prepared for disappointment, we climbed out of the minivan, cameras and binoculars slung around our shoulders, and began trekking around the parking lot. After fifty yards, Braden stopped and said, “Hear that? Clark’s Nutcracker.” We followed the harsh calls toward the back of Discovery’s first aid hut, and saw a promising red flash of something flying. Drawing closer, we hit a veritable bonanza of winter birds cashing in on a generous scattering of bird seed behind the hut. Mountain Chickadees flew out to greet us first, but we soon encountered almost every other bird we could imagine: Steller’s Jays, Clark’s Nutcrackers, Evening Grosbeaks, and our favorites, Pine Grosbeaks. Each had a different strategy for attacking the food supply and we stood mesmerized for twenty minutes watching them.
“The only thing we haven’t seen,” I said, “are Canada Jays.” As we began walking back toward the car, however, Braden spotted a silhouette on top of a distant tree. He raised his binoculars for a moment, then turned to me. “Guess what it is,” he said. “Canada Jay?” I hazarded. “Yeah.” We laughed and moments later had a great photo shoot with two CAJAs that ventured closer. Leaving Discovery, we drove some side roads looking for Great Gray Owls, and the bird Braden most wanted to see before he returned to Maine for spring semester: Northern Pygmy-owl. Unfortunately, this winter the Owl Gods have decreed a limit of one owl per day for us and we saw no other Strigiformes (the bird order of owls) for the day.
Still, we both really wanted to see a NPOW before Braden left, so a couple days later we headed out to Maclay Flat, where we’d seen our very first NPOW in 2016. They weren’t reported too frequently, but they were being seen, and as soon as we got out of the car, we heard the distinctive periodic advertising call of a Northern Pygmy-owl. We followed the sound toward the river, and then crunched through snow down a side trail—only to discover a photographer set up with a very long camera lens. He silently pointed up into a tree and we worked around until we could see it—a small, fuzzy blob about thirty feet above us.
Braden and I grinned and gave each other a quiet Hi-Five. After taking some photos, we settled in to watch it. The photographer said he’d heard at least three NPOWs calling back and forth—which seemed odd in broad daylight, and seemingly well before breeding season. Biologists I’ve talked to, though, emphasize how territorial these birds are, so perhaps the vocalizations help maintain their territories all year long. Whatever was going on, we—like most people—can’t get enough of owls and once again felt privileged to enjoy them as part of our world. It helped soften the blow of missing Braden when I took him to the airport a couple mornings later. Just not enough.
Last week, Wise River resident Rory Macdonald reported a bird that got every Montana birder—and quite a few from other states—giddy with excitement: a Northern Hawk Owl. NHOWs are a decidedly boreal species, but venture south from Canada in a handful of places, mostly in winter. Cornell Lab dubs this owl one of the least studied birds in North America, but we do know that it preys on rodents as well as larger ground birds and hares. Many birders travel to Minnesota’s Sax-Zim Bog to see one, and every once in a while an irruption year brings more of the owls down into the U.S., but even so, NHOWs are considered one of the most difficult birds to see in the Lower 48. Here in Montana, breeding has been documented in Glacier National Park (mostly in burn areas), but breeding there has dried up in recent years and reports elsewhere are few and far between. It’s no surprise, then, that when the NHOW popped up last week, dozens of birders immediately leaped into their cars and headed to Wise River. Braden and I joined the fray.
Wise River sits about two hours from Missoula, and after I got up early to take my daughter to driver’s ed class and walk our dog Lola, I returned home, grabbed Braden, and pointed our trusty minivan east on I-90 in the pre-dawn darkness. Fortunately, the roads were dry and we made good time, stopping at the Deer Lodge McDonald’s for our customary egg sandwich breakfasts before heading on. We arrived at Wise River just before 9:00 a.m. “Do you know exactly where the owl’s been spotted?” I asked Braden. “In two different places,” he replied. “The first is at the USFS ranger station up here on the left.”
I turned left as instructed. No owl. Braden then directed me to another location maybe a half mile to the west. We crept slowly down a snow-covered side road, carefully studying every fence post, roof, and telephone pole. I started to get the feeling that we wouldn’t find it, and Braden did, too. In our experience, it seemed that whenever we chased something really rare, we either saw it immediately—or missed it altogether.
The road turned left and we saw a pickup truck parked where the road made another left at the base of a mountain. “I hope that’s a birder,” Braden said. I did, too, but I also looked at the trees beyond. “There it is!” I exclaimed. “Oh—yes!” Braden said.
After parking, I quickly set up our spotting scope, and we carefully walked forward. The pickup ahead of us belonged to veteran Montana birder and photographer Dan Ellison, and we enjoyed a nice, fun conversation before focusing in on the owl, which fortunately didn’t appear to be going anywhere. “He doesn’t seem to be spooky at all,” Dan told us, and sure enough, the owl posed beautifully as I took photos and Braden trained the scope on it. As other birders joined us, however, the owl suddenly flew and torpedoed toward something in the sagebrush. Watching the bird fly was a real treat. Though definitely on the chunky side, the owl “handled” more like a falcon; fast and with surprising agility. After grabbing—or missing its prey—it disappeared around a rocky outcrop.
Fortunately, it soon reappeared in another tree, perhaps hungry for more “Oohs” and “Ahs” from admiring birders. Braden and I find ourselves chasing rarities less often these days, but we were definitely glad we chased this one. This was only the second Northern Hawk Owl we’d ever seen (for the story on the first, see our 2020 post “Incredible Birthday Birding”), and frankly, I never expected to see another. Not only did this one give us great, leisurely views, it was a wonderful ambassador for birds and bird conservation.
After an hour admiring the bird, Braden and I headed back out toward I-90, detouring up to Discovery Ski Area to find a few more winter birds—but maybe we’ll write about that later!
If you’ve been following our posts the past five years, you’ve probably learned that Braden and I like to kick off a new year with a big day of birding. Last year on January 1, we enjoyed an exceptional day, chalking up almost 50 species including Snowy, Short-eared, and Great Horned Owls. This year, we didn’t get out until January 3—and following a much colder snap of weather—and weren’t sure what we might find. I predicted we’d see 45 species while Braden opted for a more conservative 40. We both agreed, though, that we might be a bit optimistic.
We backed out of our driveway in total darkness and an hour later, as dawn spread over the horizon, were greeted by the sheer majesty of the snow-covered Mission Mountains, surely one of the most stunning mountain ranges in the Lower 48. Our first destination? Duck Road at Ninepipe, perhaps our most reliable spot for Short-eared Owls. Alas, these owls are not to be trusted. They had obviously received advanced intel about our arrival and skedaddled to some other part of the refuge. As we crept along in the early light, though, we spotted a flock of about sixty small birds suddenly rising up from the snow-covered grass. “Waxwings?” I asked as Braden quickly got his binoculars on them. I parked the car as he answered, “No. Guess again.” “Snow Buntings?” I asked excitedly. “Yes!”
Can you find the buntings? Even with the spotting scope, the rascals proved challenging to observe.Here’s what they look like when out in the open! (Bunting on right, Horned Lark on left.)
We watched the birds whirl around before landing again, and quickly broke out the spotting scope. Often, Snow Buntings travel with Lapland Longspurs, but as we scanned the birds feeding hungrily about a hundred yards away, we saw that this flock was pure buntings. Remarkably, these were the first Snow Buntings we’d ever seen on the west side of the mountains and it kicked off the day in fine fashion.
We left Ninepipe with only about ten species, but felt optimistic heading north, and sure enough, found a pair of gorgeous Long-eared Owls at a well-known spot near Polson, Montana. At a nearby bakery, we also happened to snag two donuts and a cinnamon roll for our Year List. Yum!
Bird of the Day: Even concealed in this thicket, this Long-eared Owl and its companion gave us our best-ever look at these animals in the wild.
We weren’t sure what we were going to do next, but decided to retrace last year’s route and continue on to Kalispell in hopes of finding a Snowy Owl. Last year, we had happened into an amazing group of waterfowl at the north end of the lake, but this year we ran into a much smaller group about halfway up the west side of Flathead at Dayton Bay. Here we found Trumpeter Swans and six kinds of ducks, and it was a good thing as we discovered that the north end of the lake was almost completely frozen.
After an unsuccessful search for Snowy Owls, we stopped at Panera’s for lunch and contemplated our next move. “We could go to the Kalispell dump,” Braden suggested. I cringed at the idea since we’d been yelled at a couple of years before when trying to go there to find gulls and Gray-crowned Rosy-finches. The trick was to arrive with some trash to throw away, but we’d forgotten to bring any. As we munched away on our Kitchen Sink cookies, however, we formulated a plan. After leaving Panera’s I drove behind some of the big box stores nearby and, sure enough, found some wasted cardboard sitting there. I tossed it into our trusty minivan and we were all set!
Alas, we found nothing truly extraordinary at the landfill. We did pick up Herring Gulls, which can be a bit tricky to locate in Montana, but the real surprise was a group of about ten turkeys feeding on garbage. Hm. “I didn’t know they could do that,” Braden said, but it made sense. After all, the amount of food Americans throw away could easily feed several other countries. Though we failed to find anything really rare, we had completed our covert mission and headed south again feeling like we’d done our best. Click here for our dump checklist!
Who knew that Wild Turkeys liked to forage in landfills? We didn’t get any photos of this happening since we had to get in and out of the dump quickly, but thought you’d enjoy this “non-landfill” turkey—a different subspecies than the Landfill Turkey.
As the day again drifted toward darkness, we again hit Ninepipe on our way back to Missoula, picking up American Kestrels, a Northern Harrier, and a couple of large groups of pheasants, but no Short-eared Owls. As a consolation prize, though, as soon as we got home, Braden heard Great Horned Owls hooting from our front porch and called me out to listen. We ended the day with 35 species, undershooting even Braden’s smaller target, but felt good about the day. It was still a respectable number to start the new year, and with Braden heading back to college soon, we both cherished another day getting to bird together. How can you do better than that?
The Good ‘Ole College Try: As our first 2023 day of birding wound down, Braden trudged off across this field to determine if perhaps any Short-eared Owls were just laying low. They weren’t. Still, we felt pleased by our first day of birding, 2023.
A tradition Braden and I have formed over the years is to make top birds lists after any big trip or, as this year, for our entire year of birding. This probably stems from the many hours I listened to Casey Kasem counting down the American Top 40 every weekend as a youth. Our own “Top 40” lists have diverged a bit since Braden is now on the East Coast for most of the year—but this year we still managed to have a lot of birding adventures together, and so have a lot of common birds on our list. It’s funny, though, how some birds we might have been super excited about when we first saw them often drift lower on the list. I suppose it’s like being super excited about Barry Manilow when you first heard him—and then realizing you could be listening to the likes of the Rolling Stones, Neil Young, and John Lee Hooker. Anyway, we thought you might enjoy our Top 10 birds of 2022—and hope you might share some of your own!
# 10
Coming in at Number 10 for Braden was the Florida Scrub-Jay, which is remarkably vulnerable in Florida, but Braden got to see with his birding buddy Nick Ramsey on their epic Spring Break Florida adventure. Read about it here. Sneed’s #10 was an unlikely Cape May Warbler—his Lifer—that he spotted in front of the house of his good friends Mollie and Craig Bloomsmith in Atlanta this fall.
Florida Scrub-Jays are the only bird species entirely restricted to Florida.
#9
Braden had excellent adventures with Northern Saw-whet Owls while out in California, running into some adorable juveniles while thrashing through the woods during his job with the Institute for Bird Populations. Elegant Trogon finished #9 on Sneed’s list—an exotic bird if there ever was one! And yet, both Braden and Sneed wondered why this bird didn’t finish higher on either of their lists. Probably just too much on the beaten birding path. (Photo at top of the blog.)
Non-stop birding for his job throughout the summer led Braden to a remarkable encounter with these juvenile Northern Saw-whet Owls.
Zone-tailed Hawks are well-known mimics of Turkey Vultures and often hang out with them—which is where we spotted this one at Madera Canyon, Arizona; only our second ZTHA ever.
#7
Ah, who doesn’t love a Swallow-tailed Kite—especially one that swoops right over your head? Braden obviously DOES, as yet another bird from his Florida trip snagged a Top Ten spot. Sneed, meanwhile, went with the shockingly beautiful Scott’s Oriole for Lucky Number 7. He and Braden both fell in love with these birds, and were lucky enough to see them several times on their Arizona adventures. In fact . . .
Braden never tired of seeing Swallow-tailed Kites on his and Nick’s epic Florida adventure.
#6
Scott’s Oriole grabbed Braden’s Number 6 while Sneed went with Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher, also in Arizona, in a case that he couldn’t quite explain. “There was just something mysterious and intriguing about that bird,” he was quoted as telling a New York Times reporter.
Though relatively widespread in the Southwest, Scott’s Oriole is a bird Braden and I wondered if we’d ever really get to see—or even if it really existed. It does!
#5
Unfortunately, the same New York Times reporter caught Sneed cheating for Number 5, as he listed THREE birds tied for #5: Mexican Whip-poor-will, Whiskered Screech-Owl, and Elf Owl. “How can you possibly justify this?” demanded the reporter. “Well, I only ever heard these three birds, but we listened to them on a magical night in Portal, walking down a darkened road. It’s just a night that Braden and I won’t ever forget.” Meanwhile Braden went with his many amazing experiences with Prairie Warblers this year for his #5 spot, seeing them throughout Florida, including the Everglades, in Maine, and during the Collard Family’s epic New York City trip in May.
It blew Braden’s mind to learn that Prairie Warblers breed in the mangroves of Florida.
#4
The night walk in Portal also left a big impression on Braden, giving him his Number 4 in the form of Mexican Whip-poor-will. Sneed, meanwhile, went with Red-faced Warbler, spotted just a few miles and a couple thousand feet away—the first, and still only, RFWA the father-son duo has ever seen.
Another fairly common Southwest bird that had eluded us until this trip, the Red-faced Warbler immediately captured our hearts. This is still the only we have ever seen.
#3
Number 3 is getting into some Serious Birds, and Braden selected Spotted Owl for his. Not only did Sneed and Braden both see them for the first time in the Chiricahuas, Braden got to see the California subspecies several times during his summer job. Sneed went with his recently self-found Long-tailed Duck—the first male he had ever seen—and one he discovered pretty much in his backyard near Missoula.
When you find a bird by yourself, it naturally ranks higher in a Year List. Such was the case with this male Long-tailed Duck Sneed found near Frenchtown last fall.
#2
Braden paid for his Number 2 bird, Long-tailed Jaeger (a second cousin to former lead singer for the Rolling Stones) with repeated upchucking over the side of the boat during his summer pelagic boat trip out of Half Moon Bay. After cavorting with a bunch of Sabine’s Gulls, however, this bird took flight and then passed only ten feet above Braden’s head. He celebrated by once again barfing into the sea. Sneed opted for White-tailed Ptarmigan, just one of the coolest birds on the planet, seen during his and Braden’s stunning hike up to Piegan Pass in Glacier National Park in August.
Blurry photo notwithstanding (or puking as was the case), this Long-tailed Jaeger flew into Braden’s #2 spot for the year.
Drum Roll . . . And their Number 1s are . . .
#1
The adventure and thrill of seeking out and finally finding a LeConte’s Thrasher on the east side of the Sierras stayed with Braden strongly enough to make it his Number 1 Bird of 2022! Remarkably, Spotted Owl, which had been only #4 on Sneed’s Arizona Trip list mounted an epic comeback to grab his Number 1 spot!
Braden’s #1 for 2022: LeConte’s Thrasher!Sneed’s #1 for 2022: Spotted Owl
Thanks for tuning in as we’ve relived our top birds. Be sure to click on the links to get the full accounts, and may 2023 generate a memorable list for you, too!
Well, another great year of birding has passed for Braden and me—and we hope for you, too. Both of us had remarkable experiences the likes of which we’d never had before, and in the process once again broke our previous Big Year records—I, accidentally, and Braden with determination and grit. As you enjoy Braden’s year-end recap, we want to tell you how much we appreciate your interest in our adventures over the years. In 2022 we smashed viewership for our blog with more than 7,000 views for the first time, bringing our total to more than 21,000 views since we first began writing this blog (gasp) five years ago. We have never had any goals with the blog except to share our love of birding, provide some education about birds, and encourage a will to protect them. With that in mind, we don’t know how long we’ll continue writing it, but as long as you all keep checking in, chances are good that we’ll stay with it, too. Happy 2023 and may birds continue to grace your lives!
Roaring winds, carrying hordes of gulls and Northern Gannets with them, ripped past Schoodic Point as I stood on the wave-battered rocks. The sky was beginning to brighten, and a few other people had made an appearance, including a guy in the parking lot with a spotting scope who I’m pretty sure was counting migrating sea ducks. I had no particular need to talk to him. Instead I was content to stare at the sea, reflecting on one of the most memorable weekends I’d had in a long time.
One of the fun things about returning to Maine for fall semester was hitting the Cornfield Loop and seeing tons of fall warblers, including this Palm Warbler.(See also warbler photos below.)
I was several hours away from the end of my EES 217 class, a one-credit course completely confined to the past two and a half days. During this time, I and a group of like-minded students had designed projects relating to the ecology of the Schoodic Peninsula, a part of Acadia National Park. My group was chosen to study the impact that humans were having on Acadia’s saltmarshes, and we tackled this issue by wading out into the marshes around the peninsula and collecting data on trash, invasive species (specifically a tall grass called Phragmites) and erosion. Yesterday we had arrived back at the Schoodic Institute, our home for the weekend, to begin analyzing our data, and later today we would be presenting our project to the public, all under the guidance of the head of the University of Maine Ecology and Environmental Sciences Department, Katharine Ruskin.
The first Rusty Blackbird I’d seen in six years, also on the Cornfield Loop, was a key ingredient to hitting my Big Year goal.
The fact that I’d been doing science all weekend wasn’t the only great thing about this class. The food was great— welcome relief from dining hall food—and the people were amazing. It was the first time I had been surrounded by like-minded people in a long time, people who cared deeply about conservation and the environment. No one knew each other whatsoever on the Friday that we left, but by Sunday night I felt like I had made some really great friends. I talked to everyone I possibly could during the brief breaks we had to be social, including on Saturday night, when we all grouped together to do icebreakers for a few hours, and Sunday morning, when we all walked out to see the sunrise at Schoodic Point. It truly was an incredible experience.
I was especially proud to pick out this juvenile Iceland Gull from a flock of Herring Gulls at the UMaine campus this fall.
Now, as I stood on the rocky cliffs above the Atlantic (half an hour after everyone else had gone back to eat breakfast), I spotted a tiny gull fly by—one with a yellow bill and tiny black wingtips.
“Kittiwake!” I yelled, to no one in particular.
Black-legged Kittiwake was not a bird I had been expecting to see on this trip, or this year for that matter, and had the distinction of being my 498th bird species for the year.
After my dad’s and my amazing shorebirding and ptarmigan experiencein August, I had arrived back on the University of Maine’s campus with low expectations—500 birds for the yearwas within reach, but unlikely since I had only 484 species and didn’t know where 16 more could possibly come from. I took advantage of my campus’s great location during the month of September, however, circling the campus’s Cornfield Loop as often as possible to look for warblers as they migrated south from their breeding grounds in the boreal forest. During that month, I added six species of warblers to my year list: Blackburnian, Bay-breasted, Canada, Cape May, Blackpoll and Tennessee. I also saw the first Rusty Blackbirds and Scarlet Tanagers that I’d seen in six years. Suddenly, my year list passed 490. A trip to St. John, New Brunswick with my girlfriend added White-rumped Sandpiper to my ABA list, and in late October, my friend Wesley Hutchens volunteered to drive me to Lake Sebasticook to see two long-staying Hudsonian Godwits, which I got to watch through fellow Montana birder Ed Harper’s spotting scope. And then, on November 6th, I saw those Black-legged Kittiwakes, cruising by Schoodic Point, and was suddenly two birds away from 500 with two months left.
During a long weekend in New Brunswick, Canada, I encountered the largest flock of White-rumped Sandpipers I’d ever seen.
I was not to be deceived by that seemingly long amount of time remaining, however. There just weren’t that many possibilities left, and the birds were leaving. American Golden-Plovers were making brief appearances around the state, but my chances of finding one were slim. Rare wintering birds like Glaucous Gulls and King Eiders also were things I needed on my year list, but again, there was no easy way to find them. Besides, my class load had picked up significantly, and the time I had allotted for birding diminished with every day.
Thanks to Ed Harper and his spotting scope, I picked up my Lifer Hudsonian Godwits in late October at Sebasticook Lake, about an hour away from Orono.
And yet, in mid-November, a local birder reported a Snow Goose from a farmer’s field in Bangor, Maine. The next day, people went to see it, and apparently the identification had changed to Ross’s Goose. Wesley Hutchens went that morning, and reported back to me as I was getting out of my Honors Lecture: it wasn’t a Snow Goose or a Ross’s Goose. It was both. And I needed both for the year, which was ironic given that had I been in Montana, I likely would have picked them up months earlier. I couldn’t resist, but I also couldn’t get there. I didn’t have a car.
Wes solved that problem. “Dude, you’re going to get these geese. I might be late to class, but we gotta get you these geese.”
Needless to say, Wesley Hutchens had been responsible for a large chunk of the birds I’d seen this fall, and I’m very grateful to him for that. We drove the fifteen minutes from campus, pulling over near an abandoned church across the road from a large field, and there they were. Two differently-sized white geese, standing right next to each other. It was almost too easy. And yet, maybe it was a reward for all of the time I’d put into getting the other 498 birds I’d seen in 2022. I’d seen a lot of birds in 2022.
Who would have thought my 499th (Ross’s Goose) and 500th (Snow Goose) birds of the year would be standing right next to each other—and only a few miles down the road?
Tennessee Warbler, Cornfield LoopCape May Warbler, Cornfield Loop
Then, it was off to Southeastern Arizona, a region that was already wilting under ninety-degree temperatures during the middle of the day. Thoughts of Spotted Owls and Scott’s Orioles accompanied us as we crossed the border into southern California, then up the coast, across the Central Valley into the Sierras, where the town of Twain Harte became my home base for three months. It was there that I’d met Sam Darmstadt, Miles Carlile and Ivara Goulden, amazing people with whom I shared amazing experiences throughout the summer. We camped in the hottest desert in the world, we climbed one of California’s tallest peaks, we set off into the formidable Pacific Ocean in search of lifers. If you want to know what wildlife we saw during these adventures, well, there are posts about each and every one of them!
Despite all of the great adventures I’ve had this year, I never tire of being home and enjoying Montana’s birds, including the Bohemian Waxwings flying around our neighborhood.
And now, flash-forward to now, December 26th, 2022. I’m back home in Missoula for a few more weeks, then I head back to Maine to kick-off another year. My goals? I don’t have any numbers in mind, but I would like to see a Northern Pygmy-Owl while I’m still out west. Learning the Eastern wood-warblers by song would also be awesome, should I get a summer job in New England somewhere.
But what about the birds of 2022? What were my dad and I’s top ten, or top twenty? You’ll just have to stay tuned!