Great Salt Lake Bird Festival, May 17

Second day at the bird festival. Unlike the day before, my grandma and I had a couple of field trips today. The first one was at glover ponds, which is at Farmington Bay. I had actually been there with my cousin on the 16th, and that's where I took the picture of the roosting herons. So I thought that it would be a bit boring to go again. We headed over to the Davis Legacy Center, which is where most of the field trips would meet and where all of the workshops and booths were. We got there, checked in, and then headed over to the ponds. The group of people consisted of mostly elderly, with a large, quirky family. I don't think anyone knew nearly as much about birds or identification as I did (I'm not saying that I'm an expert...yet) but that's perfectly alright. At the beginning of the trip, we checked out the end of the pond, where I spotted some Northern Shovelers, American White Pelicans and many Yellow-headed Blackbirds. There was a couple from North Carolina, and they really wanted to see American Avocets. Avocets are pretty cool, and they could find them just up the road, but that would be their surprise for the field trip. They hung around me since 1. I had a flippin' sweet scope 2. I could identify any bird they pointed to. For an unskilled birder, that was a pretty good deal, and that's why a lot of these people went on field trips. They wanted to see cool birds, but they didn't know where to look, and they didn't know what they were. At the side of the pond closer to the heron rookery, there were plenty of outgoing blackbirds hopping through the reeds.I'd like to think I got a pretty good shot of one through my scope.

A photogenic Yellow-headed Blackbird

The guide had set up his scope, and the woman from North Carolina had spotted something. "I think it's a sandpiper." I quickly located my sight on the bird, and enthusiastically stated, "It's a Solitary Sandpiper." I've been looking for these sandpipers around Ventura, but they're especially hard to find in California during spring migration. (They tend to migrate south through California more than they do north) I was pretty happy about the find, and it seemed that everyone else was, probably just because it was a new bird to them. We then left the pond to go look at a Great Horned Owl nest. The owls were there alright. Once we pulled up we could see the adult get harassed by some house finches. I spotted three fledglings up in the trees. Now don't get me wrong, seeing owls is great, but finding them on your own is even better. That's probably why I wasn't very excited on seeing them. I remember owling in the arroyo in South Pasadena for many nights searching for a Barn Owl. I don't remember how many times it took to finally find one, but I remember driving back home disappointed, and then seeing a Barn Owl flying right in front of the head lights of the car, giving me a fantastic look at this stunning creature. That's what owling was about, not this "I know a spot where they're always there" crap.

One of the Great Horned Owl fledglings

After watching the owl fledglings for about twenty minutes, the group headed down the dirt road towards Egg Island. I was anxious to get back to the big stay to help Shyloh out some more, but it took us about twenty more minutes to get there since the North Carolina couple kept stopping to look at the nesting American Avocets. I was kind of annoyed, since we couldn't pass them on the small road, but then again, why not enjoy the avocets? So I did enjoy the avocets, very much in fact. Their nests are just a small rise on the shallow shore of the marsh, made of sticks and reeds. They're pretty cute when they're sitting on their nests; I should have gotten a picture. Anyway, I finally made it back to Egg Island. Shyloh already seemed like a good buddy of mine. His big stay was at 86 species already!...no wait, 85. You wrote American White Pelican twice dude. "Oops! Ah that's okay, I'll just cross one of them off." I met another great Utah birder named Bryant Olsen, who was also helping Shyloh with the big stay.. Some background, Shyloh had so far seen the most species in Utah for the year (as of 9:00am 05/17/14 he was at 279) and Bryant was number two, only four or five species shy of Shyloh. Bryant had seen the most the previous year, and him and Shyloh were having a friendly competition for this year. (every birding competition is friendly, or should be) Bryant had been scouting out the distant birds that were too hard to identify from the island, and I headed out with him towards glover ponds. I told him about the Solitary Sandpipers that I saw, and he walkie-talkied Shyloh, who hadn't seen them yet from the island. (He got them later on) Bryant said that there was a group of trees that always had Eastern Kingbirds around this time, so naturally, we went to look for them, since neither of us had them on our year list. But alas, no easterns, just westerns. however, I got an even better sighting of the Common Tern than I did the day before, it was even siting next to a Forster's! That'd be a great photo for comparison!...Ah crud I left my scope down by that bench. It was only about 100 feet away, but by the time I ran for it and came back, the Common Tern was up from his spot. A great opportunity missed, we continued down the trail. With not much besides a Swainson's Hawk, and a missed Macgillivray's Warbler and Sora, we turned around and looked at the half visible face of a Barn Owl in a nest box. We were back on Egg Island, and Shyloh now had 92 species! He had tied the record that was from two years ago. American White Pelican Oh excuse me, I forgot. He was actually at 91 still. Bryant had to go to work, so he got a move on after a couple minutes of talking. After he left, there was a small buzzy, zipping sound. It was a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, and Shyloh's 92nd bird. Awesome. I talked to Shyloh about birding and non-birding things for a while until my grandma came to pick me up again. There, I said farewell and told him that I would let him know if I was back in Utah before I left on my mission.

Scoping over Farmington Bay

Two Forster's Terns, formerly the spot where a Forster's and Common were side by side!

Back at the Legacy Center, I checked out some of the booths. They consisted of binocular/camera companies, local Audubon Society chapters, and a couple of other miscellaneous vendors. There was an art and photography gallery as well, consisting of pictures of birds from people of all ages. Some of the paintings were for purchase, and the prices were not reasonable. This lady had quite a few paintings of owls and illustrations of egrets, but the cheapest one was $500! I mean, she was a good artist and all, but her art wasn't nearly good enough to be asking for $750 for a medium sized painting of a Northern Saw-whet Owl. My grandma made some comment about them, saying one was better than the other, and the lady popped out and said, "These are mine." in a very proud and confined manner.Pssh, these aren't worth 500 bucks. I almost said that out loud. I don't know how she thought she could persuade anyone to buy one of her paintings for so much. I could do a painting just as good as hers, and charge 20 dollars for each one I did, and I'd probably make more money than her. Whatever, if she wants to never sell her paintings than go ahead. I headed over to the Mountain West Birding Co. booth, which was a company started by Tim Avery (the guy I met the day before who had the Utah big year record) where he sold birding equipment. Jerry Ligouri told me that he was the bully of the Utah Birders, but for a bully he was pretty chill. I told him (like everyone else) about my college plans, which made him super bummed, since he's a die hard Utes fan. But, he seemed excited about me joining them. Tim talked about how the young birding community in Utah has grown over the past five years, and that there are 20+ guys that are active birders under the age of 35. Sounds good to me. I bought Jerry Ligouri's books (Hawks from a Distance and Hawks at Every Angle) and noticed a picture of a Rufous-crested Coquette in the back of his booth. I asked him about it, and unfortunately he had never seen one before, but that got us talking about birding in South America. He told me about his trip to southern Peru and all of the birds he saw there. Honestly, Central/South America is bird heaven, and a serious birder such as Tim and I could spend our whole lives observing the neotropical species found anywhere south of the US border. Mexico may be our neighbor, but in the Ornithological realm, it is so different and much more diverse than the United States and Canada. He asked me if there was anywhere specific I wanted to go for my mission, and I told him somewhere in South America would be preferred. He just smiled and started laughing, knowing my obvious reasons. I had to head out for the Burrowing Owl field trip, but he gave me a free MWBirdCo water bottle before I left.

The Burrowing Owl field trip wasn't the most energetic field trip I've been on. It consisted of driving for about half an hour to and from Antelope Island, as well as dealing with a million little gnats biting your scalp when you got out of the car, so it was a bit draining. But, there was good compensation for it. The Burrowing Owls were more than present today, standing on their mounds, flying around, and catching bugs. The first area we stopped, there was a breeding pair, and you could differentiate between the male and female since the male has much lighter plumage. One young man on the field trip was from Belize, and like others on the trip, he enjoyed using my scope since I was always able to locate the owls. "You have a very good equipment. Can you bluetooth the photo from the phone?" I took a couple of photos with the scope and he was interested, so I told him that I'd email him. He was really happy about that. The guides were two ladies that worked with the Burrowing Owls on Antelope Island, so they were pretty knowledgeable about the subject. We were instructed to be very quiet when we got out of the cars and watched, but that would be common sense, wouldn't it. Apparently, the Antelope Island population of Burrowing Owls is threatened, so it was important not to spook any of the owls to abandon their burrows. I learned a couple of things that I didn't already know about the owls, such as the owls will lay eggs in multiple nests, and that the male owl will use a burrow for stashing things such as insects and other portions of food. The male is also the one that will stand on lookout as well, and much like human females, a female owl will keep a much more tidy home, defecating farther from the burrow than a male will. At Antelope Island, they create some artificial burrows for the owls, and we got to see how they made them. It might be interesting to work at Antelope Island while at BYU. We also headed over to a spot where there were nesting Great Horned Owls, something hard to turn down. I got a couple of cool pictures of two fledglings with one of their parents. And, living up to it's name, Pronghorn Antelope were present on the island. After we returned from the field trip, Javier (the young man from Belize) gave me his email and thanked me for letting him use the scope. He was a super nice guy, just a bit hard to understand.

Two Burrowing Owls watching over their burrows (I took the second at an angle, sorry)

An Adult Great Horned Owl with two fledglings. Quite an intimidating bird.

At the end of the day, Shyloh made his report of the big stay, with a whopping 105 species!!! Not only did he break the previous record, but he got over 100 as well. He thanked me in his recap for keeping him company and finding many birds, and also said that I would soon be a hotshot birder up in Utah once I began my studies at BYU. May 17 was indeed a good day for the birds.

The final checklist of the big stay:

http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S18436869

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/search

Great Salt Lake Bird Festival, May 16

I had arrived in Salt Lake the night before,  and my cousin picked me up from the airport. I didn't actually do any birding until noon, when we headed down to Farmington Bay Waterfowl Management Area after we checked out a motorcycle shop. I knew that this was a good place to look, since I had been here before, but noon wasn't the best time to go. We headed down the road (which was apparently closed...oops) and would stop every now and then to check out the birds around us. Using the spotting scope for the first time was sweet, I could spot things a lot farther away than I could with my binoculars. With it I identified a Whimbrel and a Red Knot. (two birds common to the California coast, but rare to Utah) There were lots of waterfowl on the bay, with pelicans and cormorants sitting on the edge. Franklin's and California were the only gulls present. There were also a surplus amount of Yellow-headed and Red-winged Blackbirds, sitting in the reeds and ignoring my cousin and me. Blackbirds have the tendency to be very loud, but I enjoy their metallic calls. There was a stream intersecting into the bay, where Barn Swallows were zooming around like crazy. There were also some massive fish in the stream, at least five feet long. We watched the fish for a little while since they were so giant. Heading back, we also witnessed some not as large fish battling in the reeds. (possibly carp) They were just going at it in the shallow water, pretty crazy.

On the other side of the man made Goose Egg Island (a small lookout point in the bay) is the Salt Lake Nature Center, which had a heron rookery. I decided to try to digiscope the herons. Digiscoping is taking pictures with your phone or whatever by attaching it to a spotting  scope. It doesn't produce professional pictures, but they're good enough to post.

Two fledgling Great Blue Herons with their parents perched above.

On the look out deck of the nature center, I spotted a Northern Harrier flying low to the ground, and then a Merlin sitting on a telephone wire. After that, there wasn't much to look for around that area, so I packed up the scope and we headed towards our grandma's house.

With nothing to do at her house, my cousin decided to head back to his house. My grandma had done some errands earlier in the day, so she wasn't feeling up for some birding, but she said she'd drive me somewhere. I wanted to head back to Farmington Bay, since I didn't see any Swainson's Hawks yet. That's where my grandma dropped me off. She told me that they were having a big stay there, which is where you stand in one spot for 24 hours and see how many species you can see. The stationary spot was Egg Island, which was perfect, since it gave you a good view over the flat land. One guy was up there, already scoping out species. His name was Shyloh Robinson (still is) and he's been doing the big stay for a couple of years at the festival. I introduced myself and told him that I'd be up in Utah for a couple of years after a mission. He bashed me a tiny bit for going to BYU, but I didn't care, since I bash myself for going to BYU. He told me he had seen a Common Tern flying around the bay, which immediately got my attention. I hadn't found one at Bolsa Chica, but he had just seen it right before I got there so there was a good chance. I started watching every Forster's Tern that flew around the bay, trying to see if it wasn't a Forster's. A mom and her daughter joined the sit for an hour or two, and right around thirty minutes of searching, I found the guy. Yeaaaaaa, Common Tern! Shyloh was stoked that I found it too. He started talking about finding an Arctic Tern at the Great Salt Lake. "I'm gonna will it into coming here, and then I'm gonna be the first to find it." I thought it was kind of silly, but I don't blame him for wanting one to come; terns are awesome.

Another had joined the stay, his name was Jerry Ligouri. Jerry has been studying Raptors in North America since the 80s, and is one of the best hawk experts in the nation. Now, I didn't know that until the day after, but he didn't fall short of this claim. He spotted a Swainson's Hawk flapping high above the bay, and I thought it was pretty impressive, since it took me about 15 seconds to spot it with my binoculars and see the marks. The daughter had spotted a large bird and said it was another heron, but it looked too long and stiff to be a heron. Well it was, since it was actually a Sandhill Crane. I was pretty happy to see it, since I had never seen any species of crane in the wild. But I think the best sight I saw all day was the Northern Harriers. A female was flying kind of low to the floor, just like harriers do, but there was a male following her. He was doing an aerial display, where he flips over and basically does corkscrews in the air while in casual pursuit of the female. It was an incredible sight. After that the mother and daughter left, and Shyloh, Jerry and I decided to scope the other side of the island. We had seen quite a few American Kestrels so far, and that had reminded me to look for the Merlin I had seen not far from here. I didn't have any luck finding the Merlin again.

A truck rolled up onto the island, with a giant Utah Utes "U" on the back. The guy driving the truck was Tim Avery, who had the Utah big year record. (355 species) With his stature, you'd think he was there to hunt birds, not to watch them. He actually just stopped by to say hi to his buddies, since he was going to scout out a spot for a field trip he was leading for the festival. I introduced myself and congratulated him on recently setting the Utah big day record. (205 species) after he left, Jerry came up to the spot where I was searching and I had a lengthy conversation with him. I let him know that I would be at BYU after a mission, just as I had told Shyloh, and that I was excited to be birding up here regularly. He told me that there was a pretty good birding community up here, and that contrary to my thoughts, I would have a good time going to BYU. He had fair enough arguments why, and I gave in. He was gonna head back home soon, and my time had ran out as well, being that my grandma had come to pick me up around 9:00pm. I told Shyloh that I would come back to help him in the morning since I thought he was a cool guy, and then headed off.

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/search