Mad AZ Monk

3 For 5

A sudden errand dictated a round trip to Tucson yesterday. Actually, I volunteered for it, knowing that two birds I'd never seen were being reported: Reddish Egret and Tricolored Heron. It also occured to me that this is monsoon season, which is when Cassin's and Botteri's Sparrows sing. And to top it off, sightings of the previously-nesting Flame-colored Tanagers were still current.

I worked out a plan to snag all five, listened to the sparrows' songs on the 'net, and at 4 a.m. yesterday, off I went.

Arizona is quite conducive to fast driving. On the way down, I got so into a long-forgotten Black Sabbath song on the radio, when I looked down, I found I was pushing 100 mph!

Didn't take long to get to my first destination -- the mesquite- and ocotillo-studded grasslands that flank the approach to Madera Canyon, south of Tucson. Sparrow country.

I climbed out the first time and bam! a singing Botteri's Sparrow on top of a bush about 20 yards away. At first I was thrilled. BOSP is a pretty hot ABA bird. But then I had that sinking feeling. Haven't you ever noticed that when the first bird or two of the day practically drop into your lap, the rest of the day can be excrutiating? I much prefer the days when the last bird is the fabulous find.

And so it was. I got out several places in likely Cassin's Sparrow habitat. No dice. Tho I did get a spectacular look at a Peregrine Falcon just lofting up and flapping into the day's first lazy circles.

Heading up Madera, I positioned myself where the tanager had been last seen. A too-friendly birder from Pittsburgh pulled up and chatted and chatted and...but he did say where he had seen the bird the other day. My instincts said no, but my mouth said sure, I'll check that out. So I did, stealthily bushwhacking for twenty minutes to discover that my robustly singing quarry was...Summer Tanager. Second time I've whiffed on this bird.

Back down the canyon with a couple of Hail Mary stops for the Cassin's. No way.

Next stop--the birder's favorite!--a wastewater treatment facility, this one being in the Avra Valley west of Tucson.

The Avra Valley plant maintains four sizable ponds, two full and amenable to ducks, coots, etc., and two with lower water levels and grasses, more attractive to waders. Really, they should have seven circular, concentric ponds. It was 105 at least and humid due to the water.

Birds were in fair abundance, but I was on a time schedule and had one target, reported, of course, in the furthest pond. All the fluids evaporating from my body was bad enough. But the ponds also held about 150 Black-necked Stilts. Now don't get me wrong. BNST's are lovely birds. When they feed and shut up. But when they all rise in alarm and circle you with that incessant high-pitched bark...I suggested a while back to a birding friend that if military intelligence wanted to get detainees to talk, forget about Abu Ghraib-style torture. Just incessantly play tapes of Killdeer alarm calls. Yeah maybe, he said, but personally I'd use stilts. After yesterday, I'd have to call it a draw.

Needless to say, given that I snagged the Botteri's too easily, the Tricolored Heron I sought was nowhere to be found. After an hour, I was on the verge of bagging it. But the damn sign-in sheet had someone reporting it just an hour previously. So I did one of those, "I'll just look once more, and then I really have to go" numbers, slogged back to the western pond, and there was the blasted bird, in full view on the bank, cruelly mocking me.

I was now, of course, hopelessly late for my appointment, but found the party understanding. Drinking a camel's-worth of water, I set off for my final destination. The route took me through distinctly unlovely SE Tucson to a small man-made lake that deserved its location. Looking across backed-up scum so thick the grackles were walking on its surface, the reported juvie Reddish Egret, a great bird for AZ, lounged on the far bank. Which was good, as I was really, hopelessly late for getting the object of my errand back to Sedona.

All was well in the end and I felt enormously pleased. In July, a month when I usually barely bird if I can avoid it, I batted better than .500, snagging three excellent new birds with only a somewhat life-threatening loss of bodily fluid.

Posted by MadMonk at July 20, 2004 01:02 AM