Category: Birding
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Peekaboo!
This Black-throated Gray Warbler (Setophaga nigrescens) looked like it was playing a game of peekaboo when I took this photograph along the LA River at Frogtown this morning. In actuality, it was looking for insects on the underside of oak leaves. Black-throated Gray Warbler is one of several warbler species that primarily winters in Mexico…
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Photos From a Bird Walk Along the LA River
Today is a Wednesday. Wednesday is not a running day. I had no site visits or surveys scheduled. That means I go birding. This morning it meant that I would go birding along the LA River at Atwater Village, covering the section from Los Feliz Boulevard to Colorado Street, a stretch of river measuring a…
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A Year of Big Days: April
The last weekend of April this year happened to coincide with the average peak migration date for Southern California. I knew going into the weekend that I was going to do a yard Big Day, I just wasn’t sure which day I would do it. My wife and I both woke up at about 5:15.…
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A Year of Big Days: March
I woke up on March 28 at 4:30am, not initially planning on doing a yard Big Day that day. After the coffee kicked in during my morning reading I could hear a Great Horned Owl calling outside and my thoughts turned to the fact that I had planned to conduct one yard Big Day per…
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A Year of Big Days: January
I wasn’t sure when I woke up a little after 5am on Saturday, January 13 if it was going to happen. I came into 2024 planning a year of yard Big Days—one per month—in an effort to see how many species I could get in a year and how the numbers would change from month…
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2023: The Year in Birds
2023 was one hell of a year in many respects, both personally and professionally, but this post will only cover one aspect of that: birding. In the quest for both birds and outdoor experiences I made two significant trips, and managed to see (and photograph) a lot of new species. The Trips Volume-wise, most of…
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Cuba – The End
Day 8 – Hasta la Victoria Siempre We assembled early on January 12 to board the bus for the long drive to Havana. As for prior driving days, we enjoyed getting to view a broad swath of the Cuban countryside. First, however, we had to get to the Cuban mainland and getting there required a…
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Cuba – Day 7 – Murciélagos de Discoteca
I woke up on January 11 feeling well-rested, which may have been because of the air conditioning and the plushest bed I’d slept in since home. That was a good thing because with this many consecutive days of non-stop birding I was getting a bit tired, yet feeling a bit rejuvenated by being close to…
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Anna’s Hummingbird on its Nest
On Monday, March 27 I was performing a general biological survey for a proposed project. Other than looking for raptor and corvid nests that may be reused in the future I was not actively performing a nesting bird survey as any project that might impact them was far into the future. Nevertheless, it was clear…
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Cuba – Day 6 – Por un Socialismo Próspero y Sostenible
Tuesday, January 10, was another driving day. Still, we looked for birds en route. Our first stop was at a nearby wetland. Driving a good distance east we had a restroom and fuel stop at Cienfuegos, stopping again at Jardín Botánico de Cienfuegos in a failed search for Gundlach’s Hawk. We then continued up the…