D e s e r t E x p o s u r e
July 2009
Birding
Page: 2Here you will see not only the usual resident and migratory land birds and waterfowl. You may get a chance to see "green kingfishers, gray hawks and other birds rarely seen in the United States" — since the San Pedro lies at the northernmost tip of their range, according to Jon Christensen, in an article published in the New York Times several years ago.
Birds of the Riverine Wetlands
You can know more of what to expect in the bird populations of the comparatively stable riverine wetlands, which typically occur in broad stream bottoms with high water tables. Here you can, of course, count on seeing the resident birds of the deserts as well as nesting and migrating water birds.
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Sandhill cranes and snow geese foraging in field near desert wetlands. |
Sadly, opportunities for visiting these areas have diminished as the wetlands have given way, over the decades, to agricultural and urban development. But you can still find several rewarding places, with perhaps the paramount example being the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge in central New Mexico, near Socorro.
The Bosque "is among the best places to see a wide variety of species in a small area," according to authorities John Parmeter, Bruce Neville and Doug Emkalns, in their New Mexico Bird Finding Guide. "Birding can be good to excellent at any time of year. During the height of the spring migration in late April and early May, over 100 species in a half-day of birding is not unlikely. Even in mid-winter 60-70 species can usually be found." The full checklist, according to the US Geological Survey, "contains 377 species which have been observed on the refuge since 1940."
Any time at the Bosque, you can count on seeing a broad range of water birds, raptors, and land and perching birds. Depending on the season — and with reasonable luck — you can see a double-crested cormorant, an osprey, a golden eagle or a bald eagle. With really good luck, you may see a rose-breasted grosbeak, a lazuli bunting, an American goldfinch or a little blue heron. With exceptional luck, you will see a peregrine falcon, a whooping crane (partnered with sandhill cranes) or possibly even a wood stork.
In the winter months, when thousands of snow geese and sandhill cranes have settled in for the season, you can enjoy some of the great experiences in birding. If you come to the Bosque just after sunrise on a cold morning, you will see geese and cranes rise from the water in concert, with an operatic chorus, to head for the fields where they will feed for the day. If you come at sunset with the evening chill setting in, you will see the snow geese come in for crash landings in the water, where they will raft up for the night. You will see the sandhill cranes approach by squadrons, silhouettes against an orange sky, calling loudly, circling, then landing daintily in the shallows, where they will spend the evening gossiping about their day's experiences.
Birds of the Playa Lakes
At the playa lakes — those ancient, ephemeral and mineral-filled ponding sites common in all our desert basins — you will find unpredictable, but sometimes extraordinarily rewarding, ad hoc gatherings of bird species. Both resident and migratory birds capitalize on the playas as targets of opportunities, sites where water is intermittently available — sometimes more or less annually, sometimes every few years — after localized rains.
The birds appear at the occasional waters, which may cover several square yards to some square miles in area and measure several inches to several feet in depth. They celebrate an awakened and refreshed community of life — including, for example, amphibians such as the spadefoot toad, crustaceans such as the fairy shrimp, and salt-tolerant plants such as the saltbrush. You may find a surprising number of bird species or no more than a single bird species. I have seen sizable playas where three or four black-necked stilts, feeding on the temporary playa banquet, were the only representatives of the bird population.
While you can never be sure just what birds you will see at desert playas, according to the Northern Arizona University website (home.nau.edu), one of the most reliable is southeastern Arizona's 40-square-mile Willcox Playa, especially the Arizona Game and Fish Department's 600-acre Wildlife Area. Many large water birds as well as numerous raptors visit this playa, especially during wet seasons. Often migrating northern flickers, white-necked ravens and many songbird species find feed and cover in the shrubs and trees along the playa periphery, according to the NAU experts: "Sometimes more than 10,000 birds will congregate at the playa."
The most notable visitors to the Willcox Playa, especially during wet winters, are sandhill cranes. They may come by the thousands to feed and court in the shallows before they leave in the spring, headed for their summer breeding grounds in the northern Great Plains.
Birds of the River Impoundments
While the damming of rivers of the Southwest has undeniably drowned wild and free waters, damaged stream ecologies, flooded spectacular canyons, and submerged invaluable prehistoric and historic archaeological sites, you will find that expanded bird populations and new species have set up permanent or seasonal housekeeping at the reservoirs as new environments were created. According to the National Park Service (NPS), new birds were attracted as "dams for power generation and flood control in the southwestern United States created the first large bodies of open water in this arid region since the late Pleistocene ice age, which ended approximately 10,000 years ago." For example, as Lake Powell began to fill behind Glen Canyon Dam after it was completed in the 1960s, "rare bird species and species previously unknown to the region were documented."
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Duck silhouetted on water of desert
wetlands, late afternoon. |
You will discover that the Southwest's major impoundments — for instance, the Elephant Butte and Caballo Reservoirs of central New Mexico; Lake Powell, on the Arizona/Utah border; Lakes Mead and Mojave, on the Arizona/Nevada border; and Lake Havasu, on the Arizona/California border — offer an exciting mix of birding and adventure, especially if you have a boat that can take you to the more remote and sheltered areas.
According to Parmeter and his associates, Percha Dam State Park, immediately downstream from the Caballo Reservoir, which is only a few miles downstream from the Elephant Butte Reservoir, "is the best site for land birds along the entire length of the Rio Grande in New Mexico and one of the best sites in the state. Birding is excellent at any time of year." The authors call the park "a migrant trap with a good concentration effect for migrating passerines."
At Lake Powell, embodied by the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, the bird population is very diverse, according to the NPS, with 325 documented species: "This diversity can be attributed to the colonization of Lake Powell by aquatic birds, augmented by the presence of the Colorado River, which is most likely a migration corridor for aquatic and riparian birds."
At Lakes Mead and Mojave, surrounded by the Lake Mead National Recreation Area, the dams created "vast bodies of water. . . that immediately attracted many kinds of water and shore birds. The vegetation that developed around the shores became fine feeding grounds for numerous insect-eating birds." More than 240 species have been recorded so far.
Lake Havasu, set within desert, mountain and lake and river environments and located near four National Wildlife Refuges, ranks among the top birding areas in southern California and western Arizona. At the Bill Williams River National Wildlife Refuge, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS), the riparian habitat "draws a variety of neotropical migratory birds — winging their way from Central and South America to their breeding grounds in the north.
"About a dozen endangered Yuma clapper rails spend the summer months in the cattails of the marsh and may overwinter," says the USGS. "More likely heard than seen, their dry kek-kek-kek echoes at dusk and dawn."
Jay W. Sharp is a Las Cruces author who is a regular contributor
to
DesertUSA, an Internet magazine, and who is the author of Texas Unexplained.
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