Great Plains May 2014 Birding Trip to North Dakota, Montana, and South Dakota

Each year I take an extended birding vacation somewhere to work on my various statelists, and hopefully move a step closer to my lifelong goal of reaching the old ABA reportable goals in each of the lower 48 states and DC.  Way back in February when I started to think about where to go this year, my thoughts kept coming back to MT and ND because those were my last 2 states where I had very small lists.  With statelists of only 78 in ND and 69 in MT, I would have lots of statebirding potential.  Plus I would really like to see Baird’s Sparrow.  Although it was already on my life list, that was based on one sighting decades ago in winter in Arizona which I’m now unsure of.  And then when I realized that several possible birding locations would put me only a short drive from SD, I considered a short extension to work on that list as well.  I had a respectable 181 in SD, though had never birded the northwest corner of the state where many of the grassland species breed, so I had a fair potential there as well.

Now came the hard part – planning the trip.  With no recent history birding in those states, and no contacts out there, I was truly starting from scratch.  I found out that there was a relatively recent birdfinding guide for ND and one a bit older for MT, and eventually got copies of both books which were no longer in print.  I also reached out to the listserves and got excellent input from birders in all 3 states, including making arrangements to bird with local experts in several key areas.  I also gathered some information from e-bird, though there aren’t many birders in most of the areas I was heading to so there wasn’t much e-bird data to review.  After hundreds of hours of planning I set an itinerary with the following objectives –

• North Dakota – 4 days in western and central ND to add at least 100 statebirds, concentrating on those birds most likely to be in the western part of the state.  Eventually I would need to come back to eastern ND to look for the species more typical of the eastern US in order to reach the ABA threshold (or so I thought).
• Montana – 3 days in eastern MT to add at least 100 statebirds, especially aiming for those species only seen in the eastern portion of the state.  Later I would need to make a trip to the mountains in western MT to add those species and reach the threshold.
• SD – add at least 15 birds in a short trip to northwestern SD, with a future trip to eastern SD still needed to reach the threshold.

Summaries of my sightings from each state are in subsequent posts on my blog.  One common theme no manner where I went on the trip was great success with the prairie birds.  For instance I saw and/or heard many Baird’s Sparrow in each state, including this phonescoped bird in MT that was most cooperative.

Sprague’s Pipits were reasonably easy to find once I understood their rather unique habitat of a prairie with short grass similar to Baird’s preference, but the area also needed to be hilly.  I heard Sprague’s in all 3 states as they sang overhead, but was only able to see 2 birds that were so high in the air that they were little more than specks even with 10x binoculars.

Other key prairie targets seen in all 3 states were Chestnut-collared Longspurs that were very common, Sharp-tailed Grouse including a lek of 18 birds in ND, and Marbled Godwits some of which were on territory in the prairie while others acted like shorebirds like this one in a small puddle at the side of the road.

 

Another notable sighting was not of a rarity of any kind, but was associated with buffalo at the Theodore Roosevelt National Park in ND.  The buffalo have been introduced there, are free roaming, and appear to be doing quite well.  The interesting part of all this was that most individual buffalos that were feeding had 1 or 2 Cowbirds associating with them.  It made me think about what it must have been like before the late 1800s when the buffalo roamed the plains, and cowbirds were in their natural habitat feeding with them.  If the buffalo were still around today would we be calling these birds “buffalobirds” now?

 Now on to a few specific birding highlights in each state (see my state-specific posts on my blog for more details) –

• North Dakota.  The first day featured stops at Wakopa WMA, International Peace Gardens, and Willow Lake in north-central ND.  Day 2 was in northwestern ND highlighted by birding the Lostwood NWR.  A third day was in southwestern ND at the Theodore Roosevelt National Park and Ponderosa Pines area.  And then portions of later days were at Rhame Prairie and in the greater Bismarck area.  I saw 201 species, adding 126 to my statelist - much better than I ever expected.  That gives me 204 for my ND statelist – 5 over reportable.  ND is now my 44th reportable state, and the 46th state with at least 200 species.  Included in my totals were several rarities – a female MacGillivray’s Warbler during a major passerine fallout at Willow Lake, a male Black-throated Gray Warbler at Lostwood NWR, and a remarkable albeit brief sighting of a Tringa shorebird that just might have been an alternate plumaged Spotted Redshank during a big fallout of shorebirds across northern ND.

•  Montana.  My stops included wetlands north of Westby, migrant hotspots in Plentywood, and excellent birding at Medicine Lake NWR in the northeast corner of ND.  Farther west I spent a day in the grasslands west of Glasgow and riparian areas around Fort Peck.  Last stops were in riparian woodlands along the Yellowstone River at Severn Sisters and Elk River WMAs, and ponderosa pines east of Miles City.  I saw 161 species in MT, adding 106 to my statelist giving me 175 on my MT list.  I was lucky enough to find 2 rarities on this part of the trip, both at the same spot – a Broad-winged Hawk and a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker in the Wildwood Park migrant trap in Plentywood.

• South Dakota.  I spent 2 half-days of birding in northwestern SD in the ponderosas and woodlands of Custer National Forest, and in the Grand River National Grassland.  My best birding highlight was seeing Saw-whet Owls nesting in boxes built by local birder Charley Miller.  I saw 111 species, adding 22 to my statelist.  My new total is now 203, just 13 shy of reportable, and my 45th state over 200.

And while birding along the northern tier of ND I realized I was very close to Manitoba one day and Saskatchewan on another day.  Since I had never birded in either province, I decided to make brief 1-hour stops in both locations.  Maybe my 40 species in MB and 48 in SK will help me increase my interest in listing in Canadian provinces which until now has not been a priority (I have only 352 ticks in 5 provinces and 233 species throughout Canada). 

By all measures my Great Plains trip was a great success, meeting or exceeding each of my statebirding objectives.  I ended up with 222 species overall while adding 342 total ticks in 8 days of birding – not too shabby.  And now I have more than 13,000 total ticks per the ABA definition.  Many thanks to those great local birders whose birdfinding help was invaluable.  Plus I even got a lifebird assuming I count the Redshank. 

I’m already thinking about future trips to these states.  Even though I’m now reportable in ND, I prefer to be at least 15 over the old ABA threshold to make sure I stay over the threshold in the future, so I still have 10 more to go.  So the one future trip would be to eastern ND and SD, likely including western IA (33 short of reportable), eastern NE (7 over threshold) and western MN (8 over threshold).  A second trip would be to western MT to clean up on the montane species (41 short of reportable), likely combined with the mountains of ID where I’m reportable but just by 2 birds.