Tag Archives: spotted owls

Counting Down Braden’s and Sneed’s Top 2022 Birds

9 Replies

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.

#8

Braden’s night car camping (literally) in the Everglades landed Chuck-will’s-widow on his Top 10 while Zone-tailed Hawk swooped out of a flock of Turkey Vultures at Madera Canyon to nab Sneed’s Number 8.

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!

Braden’s Tales from the High Sierras, Episode 4: The Surprising Sierra Spotted Owls

3 Replies

We dedicate this post to our loyal subscriber—and Braden’s grandma—Penny Collard on her 75th Birthday! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, PENNY! We Love You!

In Episode 4 of Braden’s California adventures, he dives into one of the West’s most famous raptors, the Spotted Owl. Thanks to his “sister team” working on this listed species, he shares his first encounter with these charismatic critters and learns about their status in the Sierras. Also see his Big Year update at the end of this post!

Besides my crew’s surveys of Northern Goshawks, the other major species being studied by The Institute for Bird Populations in the Stanislaus National Forest is an even more famous raptor: the Spotted Owl. We’d already met the Spotted Owl team once, and spent a good amount of time with Ramiro Aragon, the lead for the owl crew and the only adult we really had contact with in the field. Ramiro told us that the national forest hosted significantly more owls than goshawks. To wit, it had taken us two weeks to find our own goshawks while the owl crew found owls almost nightly, and continued to monitor them and their nests throughout the season. On the other hand, while our job definitely came with some difficulty, the Spotted Owl workers had it twice as rough. They had nonexistent sleep schedules, and were instructed to chase after any Spotted Owls they detected, regardless of what topography or vegetation stood in the way. Often, the vegetation that stood in the way was Poison Oak.

Fortunately, during our goshawk surveys, we also quickly got a handle on what areas might host Spotted Owls. The owl my dad and I had seen in Southeast Arizona nested in a shady ravine, and that’s exactly what the Sierran owls liked too, despite being a different subspecies. At several PACs we located Spotted Owl feathers, beautiful long feathers with intricate patterns of alternating brown and cream. The day after we found our first goshawks, we were bushwhacking across a hill in a relatively shady area. I had just begun to contemplate crossing a creek flowing in front of me when I heard Ivara through the radio.

“There’s an owl.”

I stopped in my tracks, questions popping up in my brain. What kind? Where?

Both were answered. “It’s a Spotted. Come up towards me, slowly.”

Seeing Spotted Owls and learning that they are probably the most common owls in the Sierras gives me hope for the future of this remarkable species—and the birds that live along with it. You can help protect this and countless other sensitive species by supporting The Institute for Population Studies, The American Bird Conservancy, and other conservation groups.

Soon, the four of us sat on a log in a clearing in the forest, staring at a Spotted Owl perched not more than twenty feet from us in a Douglas-fir. This one, unlike the one my dad and I had seen in Arizona, was fully awake, lazily watching us and our cameras. A pair of juncos hopped around the base of the tree where the owl roosted, and it occasionally turned its head towards them as if the juncos were children playing.

We watched the owl for at least thirty minutes, and everyone seemed to be losing their minds. Sam and Miles especially had never seen one before, despite hearing stories about this near-endangered species for years.

It seems that Spotted Owls are still abundant in the Sierras, thanks to having less strict habitat requirements and no competition or interbreeding with Barred Owls. In fact, we learned that Spotted is probably the most common owl in the higher elevations of the Sierra Nevada.

Meanwhile, coastal Spotted Owls are quite threatened. Instead of requiring shady canyons, they need large tracts of old-growth rainforest, a habitat that has been mostly logged. What’s more, thanks to human disturbance, Barred Owls have spread to the West Coast from eastern North America. These owls, which are cousins of Spotted Owls, are more aggressive and push Spotted Owls out of territories. They also will hybridize with Spotted, muddling the gene pool for this species.  As I stared at the owl, it gave me hope that the populations of this species are still strong in the Sierras. With conservation-minded individuals working tirelessly to protect them, let’s hope that it stays that way.

Braden’s Big Year Update: As many of you know, Braden set out to see 400 North American bird species in 2022—a goal he smashed on our trip to Arizona. Accordingly, he raised his Big Year goal to 500, and thanks to relentless birding in California, he now stands at 440. Even better, he will be heading to Santa Cruz for a pelagic birding trip this weekend and if all goes well, he may add another 15 or 20 species to his list. Still, 500 is a big number and he’s got a lot of work to do. Keep reading FatherSonBirding to follow his progress!