Chisos: Ghosts or Forest People? Road Trip Part IV

Chisos Mountains, which either means ghosts/spirits (Catalan/Spanish) or people of the trees (Apache). Both are very fitting.

We trucked it through Texas with as few stops as possible. Remember, it was June, so it was hot and my little truck doesn't have air conditioning, so we rolled along Interstate 10 with the windows down. The sweltering rush of air from the speed of the truck did little to cool our skin. We needed to get as high as possible (elevation-wise, dude) to get out of the burnanation, so we were headed for Big Bend National Park. We got up above 5,000 feet in the early evening and let the magic of nature wash over us, the clear night sky filled with pinprick stars whispered away the stress from the clanging and whooshing little metal pods that had hurtled around us at breakneck speeds all day.

On June 6th, in the Chisos Basin Campground, I wrote the following in my long-neglected journal:
"It's a warm, blustery night below the stars and I am free once again. I will not recount the trivial yet monumental misery of the past few months [at school] because it is over and done with--right now I am appreciating right now, here. This place is stunning and the heat adds to its essence--when I was here last in January 2011 (wow, 3.5 years just scoots by, doesn't it) it was cool enough to not feel particularly like a desert but now, in the heat of June, it is full-fledged HOT and it feels so real. The Texas desert...Being here, at 5,000+ feet, could not be more perfect for my soul. Sleeping outside with a breeze to keep the bugs away and a clear shy with stars--YES. Tomorrow we will hike up to Boot Springs to find a Colima Warbler--a 9-mile round trip hike into spectacular country, mountain lion country, to search for a tiny bird (my kind of adventure!). For now I am going to turn out my light and enjoy the wind and the [relatively] cool air while it lasts."

Cactus Wren, Campylorhynchus brunneicapillus, on our trail sign.

We met many facemelting birds the next day and one very exciting face-tingling herp. First, the warbler--Colima Warbler, Oreothlypis crissalis--is only found in this mountain range in the US. The rest of their population is in Mexico. They are also a part of one of my favorite groups of warblers (I say group rather than genus because, well, I liked it better when they were Vermivora) so I was excited about finally seeing this one and completing my vermivora/oreothlypis species list (SOOO NERDY. "Completing" taxonomic groups [which you can break down into varying sizes depending on how specific you get] is really fun. I've completed all the North American nuthatches, for example [that's an easy one], but I still need Brown Jay to complete my N.A. Jays). Anyway, we had only been hiking for a short while, maybe 2 or 3 miles, and I heard an unfamiliar yet familiar song. It sounded like a Vermivora song, which I guess really is an Oreothlypis song, but whatever. My first instinct was right and we immediately spotted him singing from the very tip of a tiny snag. Adrenaline rush, then relaxing afterglow while we basked in the glory of this tiny puff of feathers for well over 20 minutes before he popped down into the brush and then up the canyon.

Colima Warbler, singing as loud as birdly possible.

Insolence or yoga?

Later in the hike, just plugging mindlessly down the trail, heat setting in, Ben yelled and jumped back. On the steep hillside next to us, about shoulder level, was a Rock Rattlesnake (either Banded or Mottled, hard to tell the subspecies' apart), Crotalus lepidus. EPIC.

We didn't see any mountain lions, but the journey really solidified how much I love Big Bend NP. Our last night camping there, we sat through an incredible and very intense lightning storm that surrounded the bowl of mountains we were in the basin of. It was both exhilarating and terrifying, and it was a crazy way to spend a night--completely unprotected from the elements, electric current coursing through the warm night, cold drops the size of Gobstoppers cracking open on the dusty ground. The cacti drank well that night.

We're Not Even Through Louisiana Yet! Part III

Gator at the fishing pier.

It felt like we were driving along the Louisiana coast for a longer than half a day because we kept pulling over at fishing piers and beaches and finding cool critters and situations. The air was hot and salty, a little thick, but the breeze off the Gulf pushed it all around, smoothing the edge between stifling and sufficiently dispersed particles. Once we made it west of the bayous, the gulf waves crashed brown on the straight sandy stretch of beach that touched Texas many miles away. Porpoise backs glimmered in the distant swells. The water was the exact color of exceedingly watered-down cowboy coffee (not that a real cowboy would ever water it down) with flecks of seaweed rather than fragrant coffee grounds. I was at once in a cloud of screaming Least Terns, hovering above like angels but with anger in their cries. When they calmed down and settled back into the sand, I made sure I wasn't near any nests and moved on. I made the happy discovery that my entire bar of chocolate had melted, which meant I got to drink it right then. All of it. We made it to Texas.

Carolina Anole, Anolis carolinensis.

That's called a dewlap. Yeah. A dewlap. This is a male displaying to me, probably telling me to fear him and GTFO.

Black-necked Stilt, Himantopus mexicanus. Why this bird is not named after a more prominent feature, say a pink-legged stilt, I do not know, but I think it was interestingly named...yes, it has black on it's neck, but most of it's neck is white...silly ornithologists.

Screaming Angel bird AKA Least Tern, Sternula antillarum.

This Laughing Gull, Leucophaeus atricilla, ushered us out of Louisiana and into the ginormous state of Texas. Or he was begging for food, but gulls don't do that, right?

Shamelessly Late Road Trip Post: Part II

As you can perhaps imagine, it's been a busy six and a half months since my last post. My mind was alternately filled with either too much stuff or too much emptiness to bring me to write eloquently about my incredible road trip with my brother. But now is the time, seeing as I am about to return to one of my blog-inspiration islands, Santa Cruz, in just a few short weeks.

We drove through Georgia on the idyllic back roads, which I highly recommend, and counted Mockingbirds on the telephone wires. After a long day of driving, we crossed into Alabama and pulled in to Tuskegee National Forest, the nation's smallest NF. The pine forest was bursting with Prairie and Yellow-throated Warbler songs.

That evening I stalked a toad, which, thanks to my Herpetology class this fall, I later identified as a Fowler's Toad, Bufo fowleri.

The next day we stopped by Splinter Hill Bog in southern Alabama and strolled through the carnivorous pitcher plants and towering pines. Keep your eye out for a post soon about why bogs are so fascinating.

 
We visited my dear friend James in New Orleans and were immersed in an up-close and personal view into the underground singer/songwriter scene in the Dirty Dirty, which was pretty incredible. We camped in Louisiana and met a campground armadillo, with whom we sat for a long while watching him or her while they snuffled around in the sand pit where our non-existent tent was supposed to go.

Stay tuned for Part III, which I promise will come much sooner than six months from now!

4,010 Miles, 30 Life birds: Part I

A tornado of final exams and presentations and papers (and sabbatical replacement search committee meetings and phone interviews) descended upon me in early May and by graduation I was well beyond ready to play. School got out on May 17th and I had two more weeks in Asheville before my brother would fly out and we would drive my trusty pickup back across the country. I spent those two weeks birding, playing baseball, and drinking local brews in the lengthening evenings with friends.

Early morning birding on the WWC campus.

Redbird, Northern Cardinal, Cardinalis cardinalis.

My friend Sam and I hiked Mt. Mitchell, the tallest peak in the U.S. east of the Mississippi--12 miles round trip through lush hardwood forest and up into spruce-pine forest. We got great looks at some delicious warblers, including Canada, Magnolia, Black-burnian, and Black-throated Blue. The hike is bizarre because you spend the first 5.75 miles on a secluded mountain trail but share the last 200 meters of the trek with tourists who drove to the top and they are huffing and puffing on the asphalt road to the concrete structure that sits atop the highest point (really, they had to build something man-made above the highest point east of the Mississippi?). It made me laugh. We stayed up there a short time and then quickly retreated to the solitude of the deserted trail.

Blue Ridge Mountains

On May 28th, my brother arrived and we spent 3 days in the Asheville area to explore and so I could perform in two concerts with the Wild Asheville Community Chorus lead by Suzannah Park and Nathan Morrison (one of the main reasons I decided to finish at Warren Wilson was actually not even related to school, but to this incredible, soul-nurturing choir!). We birded the Blue Ridge Parkway and saw lifer #1 for the trip: a Cerulean Warbler. We heard it singing for ten or fifteen minutes before we actually saw the bird--dang those guys are hard to track down high in those leaf-filled trees! It chased a Blackburnian Warbler away (always a treat to see, those flame-throated birds) and took off again. I would love to get better looks at the Cerulean Warbler but I'll settle for that for now.

Not a Cerulean Warbler but another vibrantly colored shade of blue--Indigo Bunting, Passerina cyanea, near Mt. Mitchell.

On June 2, Ben and I started the long drive south to New Orleans, where we would then head West along the coast of Louisiana. I won't bore you with all the details of the trip in one post but will follow up this post with vignettes and photos to catch you up on what we saw and experienced!

It's Getting Lush/Spring Migration

One of my favorites, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Regulus calendula.

Yellow-throated Vireo, Vireo flavifrons.

The migrants are pouring up into the mountains. The trees are finally leafing out, the green is creeping up the slopes slowly every day. The whole system is so alive and in motion. To go outside in the morning is a feast of all the senses--a mixed chorus of birds, a bombardment of color (mostly some shade of light green), the spicy fresh smell of new leaves, a lightness in the air before the humidity sets in, and plenty of yummy fresh "weeds" to munch on as you walk (violets are edible! Garlic mustard, chickweed, and dandelion--a constant foragers feast!).

I will be honest with you, I have been struggling with motivation lately in all aspects of my life, but once I step outside and give myself just a few minutes with the chaotic stimulation of spring, I feel amazed that I could ever have wanted to stay in bed. I really should just pitch a tent and wake each day with the dawn chorus.

Blue-headed Vireo, Vireo solitarius, chowing down a grub.

Same Blue-headed. I had a four vireo day--Blue-headed, Red-eyed, Yellow-throated, and White-eyed.

Today I hiked all around Jones Mountain, where I have three study plots (I have a total of twelve on campus). I'm starting to gather data for my senior research--bird surveys in the college forest, basically setting up a monitoring baseline for further surveys in the coming years (whether or not the college follows through is out of my hands)--so I expect to skip a lot of class and just be lost in the forest for the next month, with the birds. I'll be taking lots of pictures, so keep your eyes peeled for new blog posts.

A Flowering Dogwood, Cornus florida.

Dogwood flowers.

Quaint resting spot at the orchard.

A Sea Duck That Likes to Golf

Long-tailed Duck, Biltmore Forest, NC.

I have chased several Long-tailed Ducks in the past year in California and dipped on every single one, mostly because I did not have a scope or a ton of time to scan the choppy pacific ocean for this interestingly patterned sea duck. I did not expect to get my life Long-tailed Duck in a tiny pond on a golf course in the mountains of North Carolina. Definitely not.

I saw on the carolinabirds listserv that there was a sighting just 20 minutes away from my house, so I swung by today and immediately lost my breath. Long-tailed ducks are gorgeous. I was also pleased that all of the four other birders photographing the duck were women! That is most definitely the first time I have come across that phenomenon while chasing a rarity. Usually I am the only lady there (as well as the only young'un, but apparently only about 6% of birders are under the age of 25). Anyway, I watched the duck for a long time as the sun began to drop behind a large weeping willow that shaded the pond. The bird dove and dove and dove, usually coming up with a bill covered in green slimy mud. I used my stopwatch to count how long it stayed underwater--consistently 21-23 seconds, and it stayed above water for about 7 seconds each time before diving again. It almost felt like a rhythmic dance. I looked it up when I got home and it said that Long-tailed Ducks usually spend about three times as much time underwater than above water...well, what do you know? Seven times three equals twenty-one. How cool is that? Animal behavior is incredibly interesting. That is one of my several very cool classes this semester, and I am loving it so far.

The following four shots are a little taste of what I spent about thirty minutes watching, smiling each time:

 

And some artsy shots:

Snow Birds

It snowed almost 8 inches last week and the bitter cold seeped into every inch of exposed skin (there wasn't much exposed, that's for sure). This week I was overheating wearing just a long-sleeved shirt and enjoying doing homework while sitting on my roof in shorts. I'm a little confused...is it winter in the Northeast? Late summer on the Northern California coast? It sure doesn't feel like the mountains of Western North Carolina, yet here I am.

Here are some photos of recent birds and snow days (three days off school in a row, the first time Warren Wilson has canceled class due to weather in well over a decade, maybe ever!).

First Northern Cardinal photo of the year. One of my goals of 2014 is to mega-crush a NOCA. This is not a mega-crush, though it was taken in my backyard, and is one of a very active pair, which means they are going to be hanging around right here for awhile, let's hope they nest in my bushes!

First Northern Cardinal photo of the year. One of my goals of 2014 is to mega-crush a NOCA. This is not a mega-crush, though it was taken in my backyard, and is one of a very active pair, which means they are going to be hanging around right here for awhile, let's hope they nest in my bushes!

Carolina Chickadee at my good friend Madalyn's farm in Prospect Hill, NC, up near the Virginia border.

Snowy morning on the porch.

That's quite a bit of build up!

Cold-footed Killdeer.

Blank canvas with Killdeer.