Olive-backed Pipit

Christmas arrived early in Orange County this weekend. Jeff Bray, a local birder, made the find of a lifetime: an Olive-backed Pipit (Anthus hodgsoni). Jeff found this bird at Yorba Regional Park. It may not sound like much, but it’s a really big deal.

Olive-backed Pipit – Previous Continental Records

Olive-backed Pipit, Yorba Regional Park, 01-NOV-14

For starters, there were only 3 previous records of this species in North America away from Alaska. (Here, we define North America geographically as including Mexico – not the birding definition). Washoe, Nevada hosted the first continental Olive-backed Pipit in 1967. Subsequent records came from Baja in 1996, and on the Farallon Islands in California in 1998. So the take-home message is, these guys don’t show up very often! Whenever a call like this goes out, birders do their version of a ‘flash mob’! The Yorba Regional Park mob on Saturday was very impressive!

I was among the first 20 birders there, but soon birders began arriving from all over the map in minutes. And soon it was a who’s who of southern California birders. And why not? This little Olive-backed Pipit really put on a show! It led us a merry dance at first, flying from place to place within the park. Frequently, it landed in heavy cover and skulked around. Sometimes the only visible indication it was there was movement of the vegetation it was walking under. But eventually, it came out on the lawn between the picnic tables and fed calmly for about an hour. Everyone there got crippling looks! In fact, the bird was remarkably cooperative, seeming oblivious to the camera shutter whir and quiet conversation of excited birders. Continue reading →

Rufous-backed Robin

The Rufous-backed Robin at 29 Palms Inn

Last weekend, we drove out to Twentynine Palms, CA to look for a Rufous-backed Robin previously reported there. The bird had been present for at least a week on the lush grounds of the 29 Palms Inn resort. This resort is a 70-acre oasis of greenery and water for wildlife in the middle of the Mojave Desert, and the owners and operators of the inn are very birder friendly. Thus, it consistently draws in wildlife of all kinds from the surrounding desert. The 29 Palms Inn sits close to Joshua Tree National Park, in extreme south central San Bernardino County, CA. Continue reading →

Lincoln’s Sparrow

Lincoln’s Sparrow in shadows

The Lincoln’s Sparrow (Melospiza lincolnii) is a smallish member of the same genus as the familiar Song Sparrow (Melospiza melodia). Lincoln’s Sparrows have nearly as broad a distribution as Song Sparrows. Lincoln’s Sparrows only appear in southeastern states like Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida during migration. They are migratory, breeding in far northern Canada and at upper elevations of the Rocky and Sierra Nevada ranges. Thus, Lincoln’s Sparrows abandon much of their listed range except as passage migrants.

Here in southern California, we see these beautiful little sparrows primarily in winter. Lincoln’s Sparrows do breed as nearby as the San Gabriel and San Bernardino Mountains. The winter range of Lincoln’s Sparrow stretches almost all the way south to Panama. Sometimes you can find upwards of 20-30 Lincoln’s Sparrows in a large, loose winter flock.
Continue reading →

Zeiss Victory SF Binoculars

Zeiss Victory SF Binoculars, top view

Zeiss Victory SF Binoculars

Some of you may already have heard about the Victory SF binoculars, the new high-end binocular from Zeiss. Zeiss added a new binocular to the Victory line: the SF. Victory SF binoculars are a completely re-imagined roof prism design. Zeiss now says that Victory SFs will be available for purchase in January, 2015.

Conveniently, we have first-hand experience with this binocular. I participated in the official Zeiss Victory SF Experience press event in Europe in June, 2014 and got to bird with a pre-production Victory SF for a week (For a travelogue of the press event birding, see Zeiss Victory SF Experience Tour, Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4). It’s a dirty job, but someone had to do it, so I happily took one for the team! We also had a pre-production Victory SF model in the store for a week this past August. Even though we haven’t seen a production model Victory SF, we can tell you already that it’s a spectacular nature viewing binocular. Continue reading →

Red-throated Pipits Return to SoCal

Red-throated Pipit

Migration of Red-throated Pipits

One of the most amazing migratory flights is that of the Red-throated Pipit Anthus cervinus. This pipit breeds primarily in eastern Europe and Asia, almost completely above the Arctic Circle, and on the Kamchatka Peninsula. There are also some breeding grounds in Alaska’s northwest coast, Bering Sea islands, and possibly also in the Yukon.

Most Red-throated Pipits migrate down the western Pacific and winter in China and as far south as Australia. Some of the more eastern breeders take a more easterly route. These 6-inch passerines fatten up on the islands in the Bering Sea and then head off on a 3,000 mile flight across the Pacific Ocean to the California coast. While annual each October in southern California in small numbers, mostly on sod farms, Red-throated Pipits are almost unheard of much north of the San Francisco Bay Area. This tells us that they rarely follow land and fly straight across the ocean. The Red-throated Pipits that migrate through SoCal winter in Baja California. eBird records show them wintering near La Paz, Baja California Sur, Mexico. Continue reading →

‘I’iwi (Scarlet Hawaiian Honeycreeper)

‘I’iwi feeding on ‘Ōhi’a Lehua tree in Maui

‘I’iwi distribution

The ‘I’iwi (pronounced ee-EE-vee) is an endemic Hawaiian honeycreeper. We recently photographed this spectacular scarlet colored bird on Maui. It was once widely distributed throughout the Hawaiian Islands. The big island of Hawai’i accounts for 90% of today’s their population. Most of the remaining population in Eastern Maui and Kaua’i. Very small groups of this bird are also present on the islands of Oahu and Moloka’i but their numbers are extremely low (below 50 birds). Continue reading →

A Fall Pelagic Trip Out of Dana Point

Heermann’s Gull, Fall Pelagic, 20-SEP-14

I recently took the fall pelagic birding trip out of Dana Point Harbor. Recent sightings of a Red-billed Tropicbird in the Santa Barbara Channel gave us hope. Hurricane systems south of us off the coast of Baja suggested that the fall pelagic might produce great birds. There had been greater than usual numbers of Craveri’s Murrelets in the channel. Many people were on the boat specifically looking for that species. Plus, September is the peak of Blue Whale occurrence in the channel. We knew beforehand that cetaceans rather than birds might dominate this trip. In the end, the trip met all of those expectations. Well, except for the tropicbird… Rats! Continue reading →

American Pika – unmercifully cute alpine furballs

American Pika in Sierra Nevada Mountains

Finding American Pika

On a quest for the American Pika (referred to below as just Pika) we recently hiked above the tree line into the alpine zone of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. We chose the high elevation region near Conness Lakes just outside Yosemite National Park for our search. Our arduous hike to almost 11,000 feet was rewarded with the bustling activity of the Pika (Ochotona princeps), preparing for the rapidly approaching winter months. Continue reading →

Variegated Meadowhawks

The Variegated Meadowhawk (Sympetrum corruptum) is a large North American dragonfly. Typically, Variegated Meadowhawks range across Canada from British Columbia to Ontario, and most of the U.S. from California to Florida. Averaging 1.5 – 2 inches in length with a wingspan of 2.5 – 3 inches, scientists classify Variegated Meadowhawks as medium-sized dragonflies. These highly migratory dragonflies sometimes turn up on Caribbean Islands and even in eastern Asia. Typically, they often cruise over dry land as often as in the vicinity of ponds and streams. Variegated Meadowhawks are “sally hunters”. That means they launch on feeding sorties, and return to the same spot, much like a Western Wood-Pewee. Thus, sally-hunting makes these dragonflies much easier to photograph than many subjects. And well worth it. Continue reading →

Wandering Skippers

Wandering Skipper nectaring on Heliotrope Flowers

The Wandering Skipper (Panoquina errans) is a small butterfly that lives only in coastal saltmarsh. They range from Santa Barbara County, California south to northern coastal Baja and the Sea of Cortez. Their range is a narrow band close to the ocean. This is because this butterfly’s larval food plant, saltgrass, only lives in coastal salt marsh. Wandering Skippers fly in late summer and fall, usually in two broods.

Finding Wandering Skipper

As it happens, one of the largest Wandering Skipper colonies is right here in Orange County at Upper Newport Bay. References said that they were present in the highest density in the vicinity of Big Canyon. So we started to look for them in late July. They weren’t easy to find! It wasn’t until August that we found a single individual, nectaring on the tiny purple flowers of European Seaheath (Frankenia pulverulenta). We went back several weeks later and found a fair few more of them, again feeding on the Seaheath. Continue reading →

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Olive-backed Pipit