In 2014 a trip to the upper Midwest enabled me to get both my SD and ND statelists above 200. Those were my 47th and 48th continental US states to exceed 200. That left MT as my last of the continental 49 states with a list below that threshold. Admittedly that is a somewhat arbitrary goal - it’s a lot easier to get to 200 in larger states like CA and TX with large statelists than in places like NH and RI with smaller statelists. But ever since 2014, I’ve wanted to get back to MT to get my last continental US statelist over 200.
My best MT statebird potential was in the mountains in the western
portion of the state – an area I’ve never been to. So I reached out to birding friend David
Donsker, and we scheduled a trip for July 6-16, 2022.
And since we’d be in the northwest corner of MT not far from
ID, I decided to add a couple days in the ID panhandle. I’ve birded ID 4 other times, but never made
it into the far northern portion of the state.
In fact, my interest in birding the ID panhandle was spawned while on a
birding trip in southern British Columbia.
At one point my route through BC took me within a few miles of the ID
border, and I was seeing several species in BC that I needed in ID, like
American Redstart and Red-eyed Vireo. I
was tempted to cross over the border on that trip, but instead decided to save
this new part of ID for a future trip.
My tentative itinerary was to make a big loop, first birding
a day each in MT near Missoula and Kalispell, then head west for about 2 days
in the ID panhandle, then back east into MT for 4 days in Glacier National
Park, followed by heading southeast for a day in the plains at Freezout Lake
WMA and Benton Lake NWR, before heading back to Missoula. That route would give me a whopping 84
targets in MT though I’d be happy if I found just 47. That would bring my MT list (presently at
175) to 6 over the old ABA reportable threshold for MT of 216, and of course
way over my goal of 200. Plus I had
another 26 targets in ID with a realistic goal of finding 12.
If I met my expected totals I would add 59 new statebirds in
MT and ID. That would give me 14,989
Total Ticks – the sum of all my US state and Canadian province lists. Just 11 short of my goal to reach the nice
round number of 15,000. But with a bit
of luck (and good planning) 15,000 ticks might be within reach. Sure would be nice to reach both lifelong
milestones, all continental states over 200 and total ticks of 15,000, on the
same trip.
With a bit of luck this could be a really exciting trip!
This blog post is the second of 4 parts summarizing our
trip, covering the ID portion on days 3 through 5.
Day 3 – 7/8 –McArthur Lake WMA, ID
Most of my ID targets were landbirds, and in fact most were
passerines. I planned just one stop that
afternoon at the McArthur Lake WMA.
Although waterfowl was the wildlife management focus of this spot,
several recent eBird checklists featured landbirds including a number of my targets. I wasn’t quite sure how to bird this site,
but found a map on-line with a couple trails shown on the forested west side of
the area, so that’s where we headed. The
first trail was in a riparian area with some nice vegetation which was quite
birdy. And among the first songs we
heard were several American Redstarts (ID statebird #1). Soon thereafter we had a pair of calling Red
Crossbills pass over head (#2). Other
birds of this riparian area included Gray Catbird, Willow Flycatcher and Yellow
Warblers.
Having covered this spot quite well we headed off to the
second trail, or at least we tried to. Unfortunately,
we were never able to find it. That was
frustrating. We doubled back and made a
couple quick stops in suitable spots along the road. On our last stop we heard some chickadee
notes. Ever since our first stops in
Missoula days earlier I had been working on understanding the differences
between the calls and songs of Black-capped and Mountain Chickadees. And these sounded a bit different altogether. I played a bit of tape and 3 Chickadees came
into view – they were Chestnut-backed (#3).
We called it quits with 31 species in some light birding in our first
day in ID.
The plan for the day was to spend the morning at the
Kootenai NWR where quite a number of my targets had been recently
reported. Then we would head south with
a somewhat long-shot try for Western Bluebird.
Eventually we would make it to Coeur d’Alene with stops for 4 specific
targets (White-throated Swift, Pygmy Nuthatch, White-breasted Nuthatch, and
Say’s Phoebe).
Our first stop was the Deep Creek Trail in the Kootenai NWR where
reports from the extensive riparian habitat included two of my targets - Least
Flycatcher and Red-eyed Vireo. We
weren’t even quite to the trailhead yet when we heard our first Least
Flycatcher singing along the road (#4).
And moments after parking we heard our first Red-eyed Vireo (#5). It was good that we got these birds so
quickly because the mosquitoes were absolutely horrendous! We lasted less than 15 minutes there before retreating
to the car. At least that was
efficient. Range maps for these two
species are quite similar – they are mostly eastern species in the US, but in Canada
their range extends all the way west to British Columbia. These western populations barely extend to
the US Pacific Northwest including the panhandle of ID. My Red-eyed Vireo statebird map pretty
closely matches their range map, minus a couple front range states where I
still need it as migrant.
My Least Flycatcher map is similar, though I still need them as a migrant in a couple southeastern states, and have seen them as a rarity in AK and AZ.
Next we were on to the trails near the refuge. The western edge of the refuge was in the mountains and several trails took you through nice conifer forest. We didn’t see much here, but did have some nice waterfalls.
And most of the refuge was in the floodplain of the Kootenai River, including some nice meadows with wildflowers that were quite attractive just after dawn.
Next we headed to the headquarters buildings to look for Hummingbirds
and Say’s Phoebe reported there recently.
Sure enough as we neared the admin building we spotted a male Rufous perched
on the fence around the building (#6).
We ended up finding 2 feeders, and the male Rufous was defending both
from at least 3 other hummers – a female Black-chinned, a female Calliope, and
a female Rufous. We then continued along
the trail to a couple other buildings hoping to run into a Say’s Phoebe but to
no avail. It would turn out to be the
first of several failed Phoebe searches for us in ID.
We then headed north along the western edge of the refuge back
in the conifers making a few stops along the way. Here we had some of the “regulars” like
Black-capped and Chestnut-backed Chickadees, Hammond’s Flycatcher, and the ever-present
Swainson’s Thrushes. We had just one new
statebird - a cooperative singing Pacific Wren right along the road (#7).
We had just one more stop at the refuge – to try for
Grasshopper Sparrow in the grasslands along the auto tour loop. Although it had nested there the last several
years, none had been found there in 2022.
But we decided to give it a quick try anyway. The grasslands looked perfect for
Grasshoppers, but not this year apparently.
We were done birding Kootenai NWR early, mostly because our first
walk at Deep Creek Trail was cut short because of the hordes of mosquitoes. So we decided to bird one more nearby site that
we planned to hit the next day – Ball Creek Ranch Preserve. This is a Nature Conservancy site featuring
large wetlands, conifer woodlands, and a working farm. Our key target here was Say’s Phoebe that had
been reported a number of times. We
presumed they were nesting around the farm buildings somewhere. But despite wandering all around the farm we
were unsuccessful. Next we took a short
drive up a National Forest road into the conifers. We weren’t there long, but did hear our first
Pileated Woodpecker (#8). The range map
for Pileated is similar to those of several other of my targets – principally
an eastern bird in the US but found in Canada coast-to-coast, and then into the
northwest portion of the US.
Other more regular species included Red Crossbill, Siskin, and Red-breasted Nuthatch, along with a less common Steller’s Jay.
Next we headed south toward Coeur d’Alene to try for several
species that were less likely near the northern tip of the state. Our first stop was to look for Western
Bluebird along West Shingle Road near Sandpoint. There were several Bluebird reports in recent
years along this road, and one report of a nesting pair earlier in the
summer. We found a number of boxes along
the road, but no Bluebirds. This would
be just the first of many failed Bluebird searches for us during the trip.
A short ride later we arrived at Falls Park in Coeur d’Alene
where a small group of White-throated Swifts had been reported in the cliffs
below the park. The good news is that we
found them quite quickly. The bad news
is that it turned out I didn’t need them for my ID list after all. On the brighter side we did find Pygmy
Nuthatches in the park, one I truly did need for my list (#9). I just need this species in two more states
to finish filling in my statebird map.
Then it was on to the adjacent Q’Emiln Park where White-breasted Nuthatches had been reported. But as we got close to the park we saw that they were having some kind of event there, the park was loaded with people, and the parking lot was full. So it was off to our next spot, Higgens Point where a family of Say’s Phoebes had been reported recently. But when we got there the habitat was all wrong, and again it was teeming with people. So much for birding on a weekend afternoon in good weather.
As we headed back north to our hotel on a whim we did a
quick search for other recent Bluebird sightings. It turned out that there were 3 recent
sightings at Farragut SP which was just off our route. One report was assigned to the park hotspot
and 2 were at specific locations in the park.
When specific locations are provided instead of using the general
hotspot it can really be helpful in finding your targets. We were cautiously optimistic. We headed to the first specific location only
to realize that the pin was an incorrectly placed in a random location. Ugh.
Then we headed to the next location which turned out to be perfect. It was at a disc golf course, which the
birder had apparently birded while playing a round of golf just 2 days
earlier. And he had both Western
Bluebird and Say’s Phoebe. Alas, we walked
the entire course, going through good habitat for both species, but found very
few birds at all. Chalk it up to the
challenges of afternoon birding in the summer I guess. It was a long ride to Coeur d’Alene and back
for just 1 new species, but it was 1 more than I had the day before.
Day 5 – 7/10 – ID Boreal Habitat and Chasing Stakeouts, Wayfarers SP in MT
This day featured birding just south of the US/Canada border
in excellent boreal habitat. And this
time the site did not disappoint. Our
birding started with a 9-mile uphill drive on Smith Creek Road. Soon after we began we had the first of many
singing Varied Thrushes (#10), and a bit later flybys of 4 Vaux’s Swifts
(#11).
At one point we got this great shot of the valley down
below.
Other birds along the way were typical of the boreal habitat and included Mountain and Chestnut-backed Chickadees, Pacific Wrens, Red-naped Sapsuckers, Red Crossbills, a Steller’s Jay, and an Evening Grosbeak.
Next we were on to Saddle Pass even higher in the
mountains. But first we took a short
side road because Spruce Grouse had been reported there recently. We hadn’t gone more than 100 feet when I
spotted an out-of-place “lump” on the side of the road. I quickly put it in my binocs and it was a
hen Spruce Grouse (#12). And she had 2
chicks that couldn’t have been more than a couple days old. One of the key highlights of the trip! As is often the case she was very tame,
allowing me to take this photo holding my phone up to my binoculars. The 2 chicks are in the grass close to the
road edge with mom to the right.
And this is a close-up of the hen while the chicks are under her hiding.
Then we backed up and returned to the road to Saddle Pass. Although we didn’t add anything new here the habitat was tremendous.
And there were many clumps of this Bear Grass that were in full bloom.
Typical birds along this route included Black-capped, Mountain, and Chestnut-backed Chickadees, Golden-crowned Kinglets, Red Crossbills including a family group, Nashville Warblers, Fox Sparrow, and Townsend’s Warbler.
On our way back down we made a few more stops hoping for a
couple more of our boreal targets, and it’s a good thing we did. At one stop we had a group of 4 White-winged
Crossbills fly right over our heads calling (#13). What a great way to end our morning in the
mountains!
Our next stop was just a few miles to the south in the
Parker Ridge Burn along Westside Road. A
family of rare Alder Flycatchers have bred for several years at one spot in the
burn area, mixed in with a number of the expected Willow Flycatchers. Directions on eBird have been excellent, so
it was easy to find the right location.
We drove up to the spot and waited.
Within just a few minutes an Alder Flycatcher began to sing – we heard
it many times during our brief visit there (#14). That was easy. We also had a Merlin pass overhead while we
were there. Luckily it was not chasing
after small Flycatchers.
Our last two stops in ID were to chase after recently
reported targets. The first was a Say’s
Phoebe found just a few days earlier along Copeland Road. We got to the site and found a number of farm
buildings and fence posts that looked ideal, but again we missed the
Phoebe. Then we went to grassy fields
next to ball fields in Bonners Ferry where Grasshopper Sparrow had just been
reported. But we struck out on this one
too.
Although we weren’t able to end the ID portion of our trip
on a high note, I still added 14 new birds for my ID list – 2 more than I
expected. And our 93 species in ID was a
good total for just a couple days of birding.
The remaining MT portion of our trip, days 5 through 11, is
summarized in the next two blog posts.
