Wildbird Wednesday: More Birds of Yellowstone and the Centennial Valley

I haven't been trying to take pictures of birds, especially, but the pictures keep building as I've done some raptor surveys and visited Yellowstone three times.

And I wanted to give you an update on my eagle survey.  I'm now sure that the Idlewild Eagles had a failed nest.  They have not even been sitting near their nest for the last several days.   But the last time I saw them, one of them returned from lower lake without any food.  So there were no babies this year.

I spent about an hour looking for the Upper Lake Eagles last Thursday.  I saw an adult at the nest they are not using this year.  Then I saw two eagles in the area I walked, while trying to find a nest.  One sat on the top of a spruce and exercised its wings like a fledgling would do.  Both birds flew down out of sight.  I didn't have enough light to see if they had white heads.  But I think they were dark and possibly fledglings.

While Teri and I were on our survey, we found a little Honda Fit would get all the way back to Culver's Pond. There we were able to find two juvenile bald eagles.  (AND then the first one turned out to be a golden eagle - the ONLY one on our count.)  Last year, I was the person who spotted three.  This year, I spotted this bird but was wrong on my call. One was on the rock hillside to the right of the road, and the other was about a quarter of a mile away near the nest tree.  The latter was much smaller and very dark and may not have yet fledged. I was also excited to see my first sage thrasher on Red Rock Lakes NWR while we were at Culver's Pond.

The first immature we found - but it turned out to be a golden eagle - probably a 2 -year old

The second immature we found - note nest in lower right corner this is a bald eagle

Sage Thrasher  - my first at Red Rock Lakes

We dragged ourselves away from the eagles and other local birds,  and discussed how we were having lots more fun doing the survey by ourselves and getting to spend more time with the birds we found. But when we calculated the time already passed vs. the distance already done, we realized we would have to pick up the pace.  And even though we did move faster, especially in long stretches without raptors, we had to stop and spend a little time with some of the special birds we saw.  And we had to really look for the Golden Eagles, which successfully hid from us.  I had found three last year but only remembered where I'd seen one of them. Teri remembered a second place but they were both without golden eagles.  (We didn't discover we had see a golden eagle for several more days. )

Adult eagle by dam on Lima Reservoir

We finally started seeing ferruginous hawks on the north side as we got closer to Lima.  We even had one or two more just before we re-entered the refuge from the west side.  We had a very enjoyable day and found twenty-nine raptors, including bald eagles, American kestrels, prairie falcons, red tailed hawks, Swainson's hawks, ferruginous hawks and the golden eagle.

Ferruginous hawk on a electric pole 

We also got one short-eared owl - the one that I know from my fencing days.  Teri is amazing and can spot birds at at least 300 yards while driving. So I don't think we missed many.  Imagine my dismay, when I went to the dam at Lower Lake and found a peregrine falcon which had managed to hide out from us on the count. But we had run out of time a few hours earlier and had to get to our reserved campsite in Yellowstone before we could rest.

We continued to keep a lookout for birds while in Yellowstone and took time to look at the ducks.  Most of them were mallards, but we think we found a female pintail duck with babies.  (Please comment on this and help us confirm this ID.) We also saw swans and pelicans as well as the ever present Canada geese and ravens.

Think this is a female pintail and part of her brood

A mallard female at a distance but showing her speculum

One of the begging gray jays that  could always find us lunching

One of the many spotted sandpipers we saw - this on on Grebe Lake

Back at Red Rock Lakes I found I had even more hummers in my yard and that the juvenile pine siskins had found my feeders. So now I have Cassin's finches, pine siskins, white -crowned sparrows, robins, cliff sparrows, broad tailed hummingbirds and, I think, one immature rufus.  My adult male had moved on while I was in Yellowstone.  But I did have a beautiful Swainson's hawk hanging out in the fire tower, just above my trailer, for most of a morning. And I get a lot of kestrels flying across my yard.

Swainson's hawk on fire tower

Two of my yard white-crowned sparrows

My yard is abuzz with (mostly) broad-tailed hummers

Sometimes two will share a flower head

 I did my next to last bluebird survey last Friday.  I had one nest of four 19-day old bluebirds and three nests of tree swallows.  They should all fledge before I visit them again.  When I stopped to clean the restrooms at Upper Lake Campground, I found a beautiful male western tanager posing for me.

Western tanager

The swallows and yellow headed blackbirds are making up large flocks while disappearing from their breeding spots. I'm still seeing a few swallows feeding babies in the nests, but most of them or either finished parenting or feeding fledglings.  The mornings are so quiet, and dark, that I'm sleeping  later then I ever have here. The numbers of all birds are decreasing and reminding me that fall will be here in just a blink or two of my eyes.

Gangs of yellow headed blackbirds are sitting on fences on Lower Lake

For more wild bird blogs, click on the picture:

In Search of Bald Eagles

July 7, 2015

My boss gave me an seemingly easy job.  "Go find our three breeding pair of bald eagles and see if they have young." Two of these pairs are along the route of my bluebird trail so it seemed like a no brainer.

I personally call the eagles, the Idlewild Eagles, because they have a nest near that spot on Lower Lake, Upper Lake Eagles, and Culver Pond Eagles, again named for their locations.

I haven't made it to Culver Pond yet because I need a truck, which means I need to go after work or on the weekends - we are vehicle poor here- and also need someone to be here to call for help, if needed.

I thought I knew exactly where the Idlewild bald eagles are nesting across from my Bluebird Box16W.

The tree seems to have two nests in it

But maybe not.

A tree further to the left of the one in the first picture

And they mostly just sit - sometimes for the 30 - 40 minutes I watch them.  But the other day, I heard crows behind the nest and one eagle went on a little flight that looked like the kind of flights they do when protecting an active nest. But I've seen no feeding, and no babies.


The Upper Lake Eagles are even harder to see.  They have one nest where it is easy to observe from the road.  But they are using a nest in the last group of Engelmann Spruce along Upper Lake  - near the southeastern end.  I spent about an hour just observing and did find the parents.  But no nest and no young were visible.  So I decided to hike in and find the nest.

The Upper Lake eagles have a nest in this patch of trees

Almost as soon as I left the car, and before I found a way through the strip of willows, a bald eagle came flying at me, screaming.  It continued to either fly or sit in the top of a tree and curse me.  Finally, a few hours later, its mate joined in the yelling. But even though I wove back and forth through the area, I never could see the nest.  But I had a wonderful morning walking through forest, meadow, and marsh and having to jump little streams or backtrack for larger ones.

An unhappy bird

I found a nice game trail through the willows. And I was calling to any bears
and had my bear spray. 

Curse you, woman.  Get off my property!

Almost stepped in this lovely little pool

Liatris likes marshy places - these are almost at the end of their bloom

Some parts looked like Goldilocks' woods

Many of the trees had bases about a foot high, made of leftover
pieces of pinecone - left behind by the numerous squirrels in the area

I scared a squirrel away from his dinner

You can't see me

One of several streams I crossed

He's STILL mad at me and now so was his mate

Indian paintbrush was blooming heavily in places

A view of Upper Lake as I was walking out

This eagle watched me leave, still yelling

I'm sure these guys have an active nest. I'll keep watching for fledglings.

On the personal front, friends have just left from meeting me in Yellowstone for four days.  I'm working four or five hard and long days, then taking off to play with another friend next weekend. Last week, I only worked Friday and Saturday so  I am working more hours to catch up.  While helping Jim with fencing, I got to see a brief glimpse of the back end of a baby moose. And one of my tree swallow parents managed to raise EIGHT babies - they will fledge in the next few days. Life is excellent.