The following page is devoted to my roadtrip photos of birds from a few birding hotspots in southeast Arizona. Clearly, I did not photograph every kind of bird that can be found in southeast Arizona, but I have provided a selection of some of my favorite photos of the birds I did happen to see as I passed through.

From the wet and cool early Spring weather of the Vancouver area, I headed straight for the heat of Southeast Arizona, one of the nation's top birding locations. With it's lush canyons, cottonwood-lined streams, refuges and reservoirs, and favorable weather and consistent food supply, Southeastern Arizona is home to an incredible variety and volume of birds. Moreover, due to its position on the Mexican border, several Mexican migrants can be found in Southeast Arizona.

I stopped at three birding hotspots in Southeast Arizona, all within a couple of hours drive of each other: the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum (just outside of Tuscan), Madera Canyon, and Patagonia. The aviaries and controlled natural environment at the extensive Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum host a wide selection of birds native to the area. Madera Canyon-where I did most of my birding near the feeders of the Santa Rita Lodge and on trails near the head of the canyon-provided a selection of birds from a mountain zone. Patagonia-where I spent a few hours each at Patagonia-Sonoita Creek Preserve, Patagonia Lake State Park, the popular Roadside Rest area, and the feeders at Marion Paton's House (a private residence whose bird feeders have become so successful that they've created a public viewing area)-rounded out my visit by providing a selection of birds from a riparian zone.

By mid-day temperatures were climbing towards the triple digits, but in the morning hours birds were everywhere, reveling the cooler morning temperatures. My birding adventure began with a flurry of new colorful birds. I saw many southeast Arizonan specialties, including an elusive Elegant Trogon (which I found by following its distinctive barking call), a Magnificent Hummingbird (one of the many hummingbirds southeast Arizona is known for), and a Flame-colored Tanager (many birders come to Madera Canyon in hopes of seeing this bird). The great birding in Southeast Arizona set the stage for my trip - would there be as many birds at my next stop in southern Texas? Go back to the main page of my birding roadtrip to find out (after you're done looking at these photos, of course)!

I photographed a few other birds while driving through the area near SE Arizona.

The following page is devoted to my roadtrip photos of birds from various birding hotspots in southern Texas. Clearly, I did not photograph every kind of bird that can be found in southern Texas, but I have provided a selection of some of my favorite photos of the birds I did happen to see as I passed through.

I left the colorful and bountiful birds of SE Arizona and headed towards another great birding area, Big Bend National Park in Texas. This area was not only quite scenic, but also had birds everywhere. I birded for an evening and morning at the Rio Grande Village area on the east end of the park. There were so many birds I had a hard time deciding which one to point my camera at! Then I dove 30 miles over to Chinos Basin, where the increased elevation led to some different birds. I hiked the 9.5 mile loop up to Boot Canyon in hopes of finding the Coloma Warbler (the only place it is found in the US), but unfortunately didn't see one (but got plenty of photos of Blue-gray gnatcatchers and Hutton's vireo in a hopeful attempt that these small birds were actually the Coloma warbler). I would have liked to stay at least one more day in the Park, but I wanted to avoid the weekend crowds at my next Texan destination: Santa-Ana and Laguna-Atascosa National Wildlife Refuges in the Lower Rio Grande Valley.

(I went to three major birding areas in Texas: (1) Big Bend National Park, (2) the Rio Grande Valley (where I went to Santa-Ana NWR and Laguna Atascosa NWR), and (3) Upper Texas Gulf Coast (where I went to Goose Island State Park, High Island and Bolivar Flats, and Sabine Woods). These three areas are so far apart and have their own distinct birds, so I grouped the birds separately by location.)

After Big Bend, my next stop in Texas was a few days of chasing birds in the lower Rio Grande Valley. I went to two well-known National Wildlife Refuges - the Santa-Ana NWR and the Laguna Atascosa NWR. Together these refuges provided a wide selection of birds - Santa Ana is located along the banks of the lower Rio Grande and Laguna Atascosa is located about 40 miles to the east on the lower Gulf coast. Again, I racked up quite a list of different species and got some photos of a few southern Texan / Mexican specialties such as the Olive Sparrow, Green Jay, Groove-billed Ani, Crested Caracara, Great Kiskadee, Plain Chachalaca, Black-crested Tufted Titmouse, Altamira Oriole, White-tipped Dove, and Clay-colored Robin. Wherever I drove, I saw Scissor Tailed Flycatchers decorating the telephone wires, but whenever I pulled over to get a photograph, the bird would fly away. At this rate, I wondered how many days it would take me to drive to my next birding stop in the famed spring migration birding hot spot of High Island, TX.

From the Rio Grande Valley, I began to make my way up the Gulf Coast of Texas. I spent a night in the campground at Goose Island State Park, and found several birds there. Next, I made my way up the coast to the famed High Island and the nearby Bolivar Flats. I spent a few days here, photographing the swarms of shorebirds at Bolivar Flats and colorful variety of woodland and marsh birds in the High Island area (Boy Scout Woods and Smith Oaks Wildlife Sanctuary). There were about as many bird fanatics as birds, and I enjoyed talking to the many interesting people I met from all over the country. I heard of a Painted Bunting being sighted at Sabine Woods (1 hr further up the coast), so I headed over here to find it. Unfortunately, although this stunning bird is relatively common in this part of the country, I did not see one, and. I hoped I would see on at my next stop, which would be Dauphin Island, Alabama, another spring migration birding hotspot.

The following page is devoted to my roadtrip photos of birds I found on Dauphin Island, Alabama. Clearly, I did not photograph every kind of bird that can be found on Dauphin Island, but I have provided a selection of some of my favorite photos of the birds I did happen to see as I passed through.

My travels next took me east along the Gulf of Mexico to Dauphin Island, Alabama. Like the Upper Gulf Coast of Texas, Dauphin Island is a well-known birding hotspot during spring migration, especially after a late-season cold front entering the Gulf of Mexico. Migrants that departed the previous evening from the Yucatan Peninsula or other sites in southern Mexico, Belize, Cuba, and possibly even points farther south on a tailwind may encounter heavy rain and a wind shift to the north or northwest as they near and cross the cold front. A journey that normally might be some 500 miles and take some 15 hours to complete has now become a battle for life, and birds will look for the first patch of trees or brush along the immediate coast.

When I arrived on Dauphin Island, the sunny weather made for favorable flying conditions, and as a result the songbirds stopped only briefly to refuel when they passed over Dauphin Island in the early afternoon (afternoon is the best time to find birds on this island due to its position along the migration flyway). So after finding empty trees at the popular Shell Mounds and the Audubon Sanctuary on the east end of the island, I went to look for some shorebirds on the west end of the island (where I was happy to find some American Oystercatchers, as at home I had only seen Black Oystercatchers). The next day was a bit more productive for songbirds, as a thundershower generated a population boom of Red-eyed Vireos, and a small (but noticeable) increase in warblers, tanagers, hummingbirds, and grosbeaks.

All in all, my visit to Dauphin Island was a success, as I added several more birds to my growing road trip list: Black-billed Cuckoo, Bobolink, Common Loon, American Oystercatcher, Semipalmated Plover, Spotted Sandpiper, Bank Swallow, Great Crested Flycatcher, and Whimbrel. (However, by the end of my birding road trip, the only bird I had see on Dauphin Island that I had not seen anywhere else on my travels was the American Oystercatcher.)

After Dauphin Island, I continued my quest for the Painted Bunting. I had called around and discovered that the Painted Buntings had arrived at their nesting grounds in South Carolina in mid-April, so I jumped in my Subaru and made the 12 hour drive to the Huntington Beach State Park on the Atlantic Coast of South Carolina, visions of blue and red Painted Buntings dancing in my head.

The following page is devoted to my roadtrip photos of birds from Huntington Beach State Park on the South Carolina coast. Clearly, I did not photograph every kind of bird that can be found at Huntington Beach SP, but I have provided a selection of some of my favorite photos of the birds I did happen to see as I passed through.

One of the birds I wanted to see (and photograph, of course) was a Painted Bunting. The male of this species looks like he has bathed himself on a paint pallet, first immersing himself in the brilliant red paint, then rolling his back around in the electric greens and lemon yellows, and finishing off by dunking his head in the ocean blue. When I was in Texas and on Dauphin Island, I seemed to be one step behind the migration of the Painted Buntings towards their nesting grounds in the southeast, so I called some of the parks and wildlife refuges on the southeast coast, and discovered that these beautiful birds had arrived at Huntington Beach State Park in South Carolina.

I enjoyed my stay at Huntington Beach State Park, where the nice—albeit expensive—camping facilities and wide range of habitats-marshland, beaches, and woodland-gave rise to comfortable and successful birding. I found herons, plovers, and sandpipers (as well as alligators) in the marshes; I found gulls, terns, and pelicans along the beach; and I found buntings, titmouse, warblers, and thrashers in the trees. One of the most reliable places for songbirds was around the feeders of the Education Center, which is where I planted myself when I arrived, determined to stay there until I saw a Painted Bunting. A few hours later, I not only had a photo of a Painted Bunting worthy of hanging on my wall, but I found myself holding one of the beautiful little birds in my hand (I was lucky enough to be there at the same time as a wildlife biologist who was trapping and banding the buntings).

I stayed at Huntington Beach State Park for a few days and even did a little birding at the lush Brookgreen Gardens across the street, where the prize photo was of a Yellow-throated Warbler posing for several minutes on a low branch. I moved on when the sunny skies were replaced with thundershowers, hoping for an unlikely chance that the long-term forecast of rain for the east coast would bypass my next stop at Cape May, New Jersey (or result in an incredible fallout).

The following page is devoted to my roadtrip photos of birds from a few locations around Cape May, New Jersey. Clearly, I did not photograph every kind of bird that can be found at Cape May, but I have provided a selection of some of my favorite photos of the birds I did happen to see as I passed through.

From the warm beach and Painted Buntings of South Carolina, I headed north for Cape May, a well-known migration site on the southernmost tip of New Jersey. Cape May is especially famous for the volume and variety of birds that pass through during fall migration, usually stopping to refuel and rest before continuing southward over the Atlantic Ocean. Cape May can also be filled with birds during spring migration, especially when the conditions are right (southwesterly winds that trigger a migration over the region are ideal). In the Spring, birds that began their flight the evening before reach Cape May in the early morning and stop to refuel before continuing their northward migration.

I arrived at Cape May in a severe wind and rainstorm that lasted a couple of days. I enjoyed the nicer weather that followed the storm, but unfortunately there was a north wind over the East Coast that continued to put bird migration at a near standstill. Even so, I still managed to find a number of resident birds and migrating stragglers at the popular Cape May State Park and Higbee Beach Wildlife Management Area as well as at Belleplain State Forest (which hosts more nesting birds) about an hour to the north of Cape May. I eagerly stalked some robins, starlings, and house finches around the parking lots, as these familiar and common birds had been relatively scarce in the southern states (and it was also my goal to get a decent photo of every kind of bird I saw at each location I went to on my travels). My camera seemed drawn to the yellow birds, as my favorite photos included a Yellow-breasted Chat, Common Yellowthroat, Yellow Warbler, Prairie Warbler, Pine Warbler, and White-eyed Vireo. I also saw some waterbirds and shorebirds in the Cape May area that, although all of them are common, I did not see anywhere else during my travels, such as a Glossy Ibis, Domestic Muscovy, Least and Solitary Sandpipers, and Surf Scoter.

After Cape May, I headed west to Warblerville at Magee Marsh on Lake Erie, as well as several other birding hotspots around the Great Lakes.

The following page is devoted to my roadtrip photos of birds from various birding hotspots in the Great Lakes region. Clearly, I did not photograph every kind of bird that can be found at these locations, but I have provided a selection of some of my favorite photos of the birds I did happen to see as I passed through.

From Cape May, I headed west towards the area around the Great Lakes. The area around the Great Lakes sees birds travelling on both the Atlantic and Mississippi Flyways, and therefore has a spectacular volume and variety of birds passing through during migration. My primary destination in this area was the popular warbler hotspot at Magee Marsh Wildlife Area (also known as Crane Creek) on the southwest end of Lake Erie in Ohio. As I continued my westward travels, I stopped briefly at a number of other great birding locals in the area around the Great Lakes. These included Whitefish Point in Michigan (known for its raptor and shorebird migration); Seney National Wildlife Refuge in Michigan (a nice midday stop to stretch the legs); Nicolet National Forest in Wisconsin (to find some rare Wisconsin specialties which I never found); Fish Creek in Wisconsin (where I stayed with my grandparents for a few days, and found plenty of birds at the nearby Peninsula State Park); and Crex Meadows Wildlife Area in northwest Wisconsin (to add some brush prairie and wetland birds to my growing road trip list). Overall, my species list for the Great Lakes was second only to my list for southern Texas.

My primary birding destination in the Great Lakes area was Magee Marsh Wildlife Area (also known as Crane Creek). Birds often congregate at the lush forest and marshland of Magee Marsh before continuing north across Lake Erie (or, if the winds are favorable for flight, they might instead continue over the lake and congregate at Point Pelee on the north side). I spent most of my time walking on the popular boardwalk in the patch of forest near the beach.Warblers (and warbler-watchers) were everywhere. Often the ever-constant warbling symphony would be interrupted by an enthusiastic stampeed to a recently-sighted Mourning or Connecticut Warbler or a good-natured argument over the identification of a specific bird call or a nondescript juvenile. In the four days I was at Magee Marsh, I saw most of the 28 different warblers I saw around the Great Lakes (I saw 41 different warblers on my entire trip). One day, I found a particularly active tree along the edge of the parking lot; within the hour, I had spotted 17 different warblers in this tree-needless to say, that day I never left the parking lot! Of course, there were many other kinds of birds too, and I generated quite a species list while I was in the area. I also spent a day each at the nearby Oak Openings Preserve Metropark in Ohio (to find a red-headed woodpecker and hooded warbler) and Point Pelee in Ontario (another spring migration hotspot located just north of Magee Marsh, on the Canadian side of Lake Erie).

I was told I could find Red-Headed Woodpeckers (one of the birds I wanted to photograph on my trip) at the nearby Oak Openings Preserve Metropark just west of Lake Erie. I knew I'd been given a good tip when the minute I stepped out of my car in the park, a Red-Headed Woodpecker flew out of the tree beside my car. Having achieved my goal within minutes of my arrival in the park, I set about looking for a Hooded Warbler, known to nest in the area. I heard it's call but could not find it, but when I returned to that spot in the evening, I achieved my second goal of the day with a nice photograph of a Hooded Warbler.

(A highlight of this area on the west side of Lake Erie that I went to, especially in the Spring, is all the different species of warblers that pass through on their migration path. I saw 28 different kinds of warblers in the area around the Great Lakes(compare this to the total of 41 for the entire trip), and for the warbler fans out there I've separated my photos from this area into "warblers" and "non-warblers".)

May 15-20, 2008

And a few photos from the nearby Oak Openings Metropark, Ohio (Quick Stop #1) and Point Pelee, Ontario (Quick Stop #2).

Warblers:

Non-Warblers: