A few years ago my work travels took me to
Denver quite frequently. On some of
those trips I would add a vacation day for a short trip into southeast WY or
western NE for some state birding. Along
with one more extensive birding trip to each state, I eventually reached the
old ABA reportable thresholds in each, getting to 223 in WY which was 9 over threshold,
and 232 in NE or 7 over the threshold.
But my last time birding either state was in 2010. And the ABA thresholds weren’t static – they were
calculated as half of each state’s total list.
So since the statelists generally rise slowly over time, so would the
reporting threshold. For instance the WY
statelist has increased by 8 since the ABA last published thresholds in 2011;
the new threshold would have gone up by 4 to 218. So in order to make sure my lists stays
higher than half the official state list for many years into the future, I’ve
set a somewhat arbitrary goal of getting to at least 15 over the old 2011 ABA
thresholds in each state. That means I
need at least 6 more in WY and 8 more in NE.
With an upcoming trip to Denver in April
2015, I started to do my research to identify possible statebird potential in
both WY and NE. April is late for many
winter birds, and early for many spring birds, so some might say it can be a
challenging time of year. Then again, it
can be a great time to get both late winterers and early spring arrivers. In fact, I’ve had lots of great statebirding
trips in April over the years. So I was
hopeful to have a wide range of possible statebirds in both states. But since I’ve birded those areas several
times, the reality was I had few likely statebirds. Though there were still quite a number that
were at least remotely possible.
Now it was time to plan my possible
itinerary. Because it had been so long
since I had birded WY and NE, I planned to spend roughly a day birding in each
state, and started to connect with birders I knew in Cheyenne, WY and
Scottsbluff, NE. Plus I connected with a
birder in Casper, WY who had reported Saw-whet Owls in a listserve post. Turns out she had a Long-eared too. And I had a lead on nesting Saw-whets in
NE. I figured I had a fair chance of getting
the 6 I needed in WY to reach “reportable plus 15”, and possibilities for
several new birds in NE.
But just after I landed in Denver to start
the work part of the trip I checked the weather – there was a possibility for a
rain and/or snow storm in the area during my 2 birding days, with a winter
weather advisory for the first day in the Casper area. I was tempted to cancel the trip, but decided
to shuffle my schedule to avoid the worst of the weather, and try to still get
to all my planned stops. After all it would
be in the 60s the day before the precipitation was to start, so how bad could
it be?
Work ended a little earlier than expected
in mid-afternoon, which gave me just enough time to squeeze in a couple
unanticipated hours of birding that evening before the rain/snow began. I decided to head to a high plains area just
west of Laramie with many good-sized lakes, appropriately called the Laramie
Plains Lakes. I’ve birded there several
times, and have seen quite an assortment of waterfowl there, along with a
diverse group of raptors, and typical prairie birds. In this area my targets were Greater Scaup, a
rarity in WY, recently reported from several lakes among hundreds of Lesser
Scaup and thousands of other divers, and a pair of Hooded Mergansers seen at
one of the smaller lakes. And with that
many divers, who knows what else may be mixed in.
I arrived at Hutton Lake NWR about 2 hours
before sunset, and quickly located the lake with all the divers. With a couple quick scans I estimated 1,500
Redheads, 750 Scaup, 20 Canvasbacks, 100 Ruddies, and about 400 mixed dabblers. I then started to focus on the Scaup, but saw
no Greaters in the first flock I checked.
Then in the second flock I noticed a male with a paler back. I eventually got a good look at its head and
it was indeed rounded rather than peaked in the back – it was a Greater
Scaup. Later I would find another male
plus another pair. Probably not too
unlikely to find 4 in with 750 Lessers. I’ve
now seen Greater Scaup in 42 states (see my statebird map below) – not too bad
for a bird most typically seen near the coastlines.
I spent some more time scanning the lake
hoping for something even rarer, but only found 3 Common Goldeneyes and a nice
drake Pintail x Mallard hybrid.
As I turned away from the lake to head back
to the car I flushed a large raptor from the ground which flew away with a
prairie dog (L) in its talons - a Peregrine Falcon.
An unexpected new bird for my WY list.
Although this species is seen across the country, my statebird map is
still pretty spotty.
Other interesting birds at the refuge
included a flock of about 10 McCown’s Longspurs, 2 adult Bald Eagles, and a
Ferruginous Hawk. But no Long-billed
Curlews or Burrowing Owls which would have been remotely possible statebirds.
Next I was on to Blake’s Pond where 2
Hooded Mergansers had been reported sporadically in the last couple weeks. This was a much smaller lake and easily
viewed from the car. I scanned the lake
several times but couldn’t come up with the Hoodeds, though I did find 4 female
Common Mergansers. As I left the area I
did a mental tally of the birds I saw in the area and came up with 21 species
of waterfowl. Not bad for just a couple
hours of birding.
I had a little more sunlight left, so on a
whim I decided to try a subdivision just northeast of Laramie where a flock of
Pinyon Jays had been reported for 3 consecutive days. But that was 10 days ago, so I thought it
would be a long shot. As I neared the
area I could see the neighborhood off in the distance – it was a subdivision of
maybe a dozen houses constructed in the prairie with no natural trees and only
a few small ones planted at the houses.
With no typical pinyon habitat, I was sure the flock was just passing
through and was long gone. So I turned
into the neighborhood and looked for a place to turnaround. And just then a medium-sized bird flew up
from a backyard and landed on a fence right next to my car – a Pinyon Jay. Then another one, and then two others joined
it. Then these birds flew over the road
and were joined by a flock of others - I counted 41 in total. That was my third WY statebird and another
one that was not very likely. WY was my 8th
state for Pinyon Jay - a species that I just seem to happen on within its
range.
With 3 good WY statebirds already, before I
had even planned to start birding, I was cautiously optimistic about being able
to reach my goal of 6 new WY birds. But
then I checked the weather again, and the forecast had taken a serious turn for
the worse. Casper was now under a Winter
Storm Warning for most of the entire next day, and the rain was to change to
snow in Cheyenne as well. Plus rain was
forecasted in Scottsbluff for the next couple days.
I spent most of the drive to Cheyenne
thinking about my options and trying to decide what to do. Part of me said to continue with my original
itinerary – the meteorologists were just being too cautious. But if they were right, owling in Casper the
next evening would be in the teeth of a big snow storm. If I cut out the Casper part of the trip, I
could concentrate more on NE, but the Saw-whets and several other spots I
wanted to hit were on dirt roads that were not good when wet. Given the potential weather challenges, I
decided to play it safe and fly home 2 days early, unfortunately eliminating
almost the entire rest of my trip.
But since my flight the next day wasn’t
till the early afternoon, and the precipitation was supposed to hold off until
midday, I could still have time for a very short stop at Table Mountain WMA to
try for Ross’s Geese reported there the previous week. Table Mountain is about 90 minutes northeast
of Cheyenne, and a good 3 hours from the Denver airport. So if I got to Table Mountain at dawn, I
could squeeze in about an hour birding there and still have plenty of time to
get my flight. Luckily I’ve birded Table
Mountain WMA a couple times over the years, so I was pretty familiar with the
locations where white geese might be there, and thought an hour would be enough
time to look for them.
I left the hotel at 4:45 the next morning
under starry skies, and was at Table Mountain by dawn at 6:15. I pulled into the parking lot next to the
main impoundment and took a short walk over to the edge. I did a quick scan with my binoculars but saw
no white geese at all. Was this going to
turn out to be a long 4 ½ hour drive for nothing? I knew it was really late for the migrant
geese, but only the previous week good numbers were reported there. And numerous times I’ve seen an occasional
Ross’s (and even a White-fronted) seemingly left behind weeks or months after
the flocks had moved on.
I then started a slower scan with my scope
and the only white birds I saw were Pelicans.
But then I noticed a glimpse of white in the marsh a very long distance
away. I stared at this spot for a couple
minutes until the white spot moved, and eventually a white goose stepped into
the open. But which type of white goose
was it?. Then a second bird appeared,
which might have been a bit smaller. Did
I have a Snow and a Ross’s? I tried to
see bill size and shape, but the birds were just too far away to tell. Then a Canada Goose walked next to the white
geese which now appeared tiny by comparison. Now I felt good that these were indeed Ross’s
Geese. A minute later the Ross’s settled
back in the marsh and were little more than a tiny speck of white mostly
obscured by the marsh grasses. I guess I
was lucky when I did see them. WY was my
28th state for Ross’s Goose, which not too long ago was a pretty rare bird
throughout most of the country.
That gave me 4 new WY statebirds which was
very good given my brief birding time.
And although I was very disappointed to not get to Casper and
Scottsbluff, I definitely made the right decision – Casper, Cheyenne, and
Laramie ended up with nearly a foot of snow out of this storm. I’ll just need to get back to WY and NE on a
future trip to Denver.
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