(One of the) Best Thanksgivings Ever

What better way to spend Thanksgiving than to go birding and trying some wildlife photography. I actually started the day with a morning stop to Natural Bridges State Park, but bird activity there was very low.
I have been unofficially surveying Snowy Plovers for Point Reyes Bird Observatory and have been assigned the Laguna Creek mouth as a spot to keep tabs on, so I stopped there. My prior visit turned up zero Snowy Plovers, so I was surprised to find 31 plovers there, of which 12 were banded. Here is a photo I took of a banded Snowy Plover:



PRBO captures individual birds of this threatened species and places four color bands, two per leg in a unique combination that allows them (and me) to identify the individual in the field. I record the color combination (in this case OG:AW, starting with the left leg, top to bottom, O for Orange, then G for Green, then right leg, A for Aqua over W for White) and email the observations to PRBO.
My real destination for the day was Bean Hollow State Beach, just south of Pescadero in San Matteo County. A blue whale with fetus washed ashore there in early October. The whale remains are attracting gulls as scavengers, and surprisingly Northern Fulmars, seabirds that are seldom seen from shore, especially this close. Below is the sad scene of what's left of the whale carcass, mostly skin (there were also some big bones nearby) being scavenged by gulls and fulmars:



Fulmars exist in different morphs or colors (as do homo sapiens). Below is the more common dark morph fulmar:



Notice the specialized "tubenose" above the bill and some darkness around the eye which lends this species an "angry" appearance.
Now here is a light morph fulmar:



Many photographers have been going to Bean Hollow to try to photograph the fulmars. Photos of swimming birds are okay, but most photographers feel that flying birds make for more special photos, especially with a seabird like a fulmar. Though I don't have a professional grade camera or lens, I was able to get some decent flying fulmar photos such as:



and



There were also some very cooperative Black Turnstones at Bean Hollow and I was happy to get this photo of these rocky shorebirds:



Very pleased with my results at Bean Hollow, I stopped at Rancho Del Oso, a part of Big Basin State Park, on the way back. This is one of my favorite birding spots in Santa Cruz County, but it was getting into the late afternoon so I wasn't expecting much bird activity. But I did come across a nice mixed flock of songbirds including some confiding Wrentits, a unique species that is more often heard than seen:



I also got a pretty good photo of the common Western Scrub-Jay with a nice background of vegetation:



And some California Quails who seemed to be sharing a secret:



Finally, I stopped at a spot along West Cliff Drive and got some interesting photos of Sanderlings and Whimbrels, but I haven't had time to process those photos yet. So, even though I didn't see my family or eat any dead birds, I had a great Thanksgiving photographing some live ones. I am also very thankful to have shelter, ready access to food and clothing, transportation, my binoculars and camera and my family, too.
Maybe next year, Thanksgiving will be even better.

Borrowing a DSLR

I've really been enjoying taking pictures of wildlife, and been thinking of upgrading to a DSLR. Wendy from the Santa Cruz Bird Club was kind enough to loan me her old Rebel DSLR with a Tamron 75-300 lens so I could experiment with a DSLR. Very quickly, I was able to see some of the advantages of even an entry-level DSLR with an inexpensive lens.



The picture of the flying Western Gull above is of a type that I could never achieve with my Panasonic Lumix FZ28 megazoom. A DSLR simply has better autofocusing for birds in flight.



I tried repeatedly to get pictures like this of flying Brown Pelicans with my camera, but never could. Most attempts of flying birds with the Rebel didn't come out this well either, but if I did it right I could get pictures that I was very happy with.



With my megazoom, I could get pretty decent photos of birds if they were close. The Lumix FZ28 has a 10 megapixel sensor, and 18x Leica lens. But I believe the Rebel I borrowed delivers a better image of close birds even though the sensor is only 6 megapixels. This leads a lot of credence to those who bemoan the "megapixel" craze and believe that other things are more important such as sensor size and the skill of the photographer. I like richness of the color and contrast in the above Song Sparrow photo.



Though my Lumix allows shutter speed priority shooting, I never really got results like the above photo of a White-crowned Sparrow. I didn't even realize at the time that I got an image of the tail feathers spread out like this. Pretty cool! Though this bird was very close to me, practically at my feet, I really the quality of the color and detail in this photo more than what my Lumix typically produces. Coming soon: my very own DSLR! Thank you Wendy for letting me try one out hands-on. By the way, the food scrap that the sparrow is feeding on was not placed there by me!

A vegetarian birder's food experience in San Blas, Mexico and Puerto Vallarta

In late February I took a week's vacation to San Blas, Nayarit, via Puerto Vallarta. I went by myself, so I was responsible for finding suitable vegetarian foods for eating. I had been to Puerto Vallarta a couple years earlier and was particularly fond of Planeta Vegetariano, a long-standing and well-known buffet tucked behind the main church near the malecon.



The food is safe and good and very affordable and the ambiance is pleasant with brightly painted walls.



Below is the hot buffet for dinner, which always has beans and rice and a couple entrees



The cold buffet section has several salads.



Here are some more salad fixins



And there is always some nice fresh juice. The proprietors have photos of their Asian guru near the cash register, and also have a single madonna image, which the monks pictured below it seem to find humorous.



When you stop eating, the friendly staff will bring you a dessert such as this coffee cake.



Once arriving in San Blas, I had only a few restaurants to chose from. My bungalow held an info binder suggesting some places to eat, mostly the same ones mentioned in travel books that include San Blas (some don't cover the town at all). The first one I tried was Wakame, the only Asian restaurant in town.



I asked the waitress what vegetarian food was available, not usually a problem at Chinese restaurants in the states. She suggested a broccoli chow mein.



This was a large serving and hot from the kitchen, but the noodles were plain spaghetti and they were just boiled, not fried. Not so good.

The next place I tried was Wala Wala, right near the plaza or zocalo.



The waiter here spoke good English, the ambiance was good and there was some interesting and apparently authentic Huichol art for sale. Some chips and salsa were nice.



My vegetarian enchiladas were not so good though. The veggies within seemed to be mainly frozen broccoli.



For my next meal I splurged and went to El Delfin, the expensive restaurant inside the expensive birding lodge Garza Canela. This restaurant has a Cordon Bleu trained chef and is considered one of the finest eateries in Mexico.



There was only one vegetarian offering on the menu, an excellent pear salad with gorgonzola, thin fried onions on top, circled by zucchini slices and cashews. I would eat this salad every day, no problem.



The next day I went to the beach where there is a row of palapa restaurants geared toward tourists. Seafood is the featured fixin' here, but I went with what would become my go-to selection for the rest of the trip: quesadillas. These were always the same simple corn tortillas with white cheese, but worked okay when spruced up with some salsa and guacamole and accompanied by cerveza.



Banana bread (pan de platano) is a traditional food in San Blas, but this stand



is said to have the finest in town in town including flavors such as pineapple and chocolate.

My next quesadilla experience was at La Isla restaurant (aka Tony's) that is usually considered the second best in town, but is clearly several steps below El Delfin.



La Isla is primarily a seafood restaurant as evidenced by the seashell decor.



The quesadillas and guacamole here were nothing special.



There is a restaurant in San Blas called McDonald's but it is not of the American fast food chain. The chips and guacamole here were pretty good and the quesadillas had a special Mexican cheese called panela which was a nice deviation from the norm.



Eventually, since I was having no digestional difficulties, I braved this eatery on the zocalo that was not mentioned in any of the literature.



The quesadillas themselves were typically simple, but there was no extra charge to dress them up with guacamole, carrots, beans, and a variety of salsas. Good deal!



My final meal was at the airport in Puerto Vallarta at the same restaurant I went to two years earlier while waiting for my flight. I got some veggie enchiladas and mozzarella sticks with a Coca-Cola Light. Maybe I'll be back again in a couple years....

Pacific Golden-Plovers in Santa Cruz

On Friday, April 30th, after work I went to Terrace Point, out by UCSC's Long Marine Lab, to unwind and do some casual birding. Terrace Point is a good spot to sit and watch seabirds fly by. During spring migration, streams of loons fly north, with occasional flocks of Brant and scoters, along with gulls, cormorants, and pelicans. Plus, there is always a possibility of something more unusual. On this day, on the rocky shore below the bluffs, I noticed a shorebird which I first assumed to be the common Black-bellied Plover. But the bird was very golden in color and since it was spring, I thought maybe it could be a golden-plover. I had never seen a golden-plover before, but I knew they were smaller headed and smaller billed than Black-bellieds, in addition to usually being more golden in color.



Based on that, this bird seemed like a candidate for golden-plover. I didn't have a field guide with me, but I did have a camera, so I took some pictures and some video of the plover. I knew the key field mark to look for were the axillaries, the "wingpits" which on a Black-bellied would be black, but on a golden-plover would be gray. But birds don't often show their axillaries unless they fly. So I watched this bird for about 30 minutes, catching little glimpses of the wingpits, never seeing any black. Eventually, the bird took a long flight a stretched its wings up above its back giving me a brief but good look at the gray axillaries. This was a golden-plover! But what kind? Two species are possible in Santa Cruz, American which is much rarer and not likely at all in this habitat, and Pacific, the more likely, but they are tough to separate, and I had no experience with either. After consulting with field guides and some information in other books and online, I felt I had seen a Pacific Golden-Plover, which while not a mega-rarity, would be a lifer for me and a notable find. But I wasn't sure. So I worked on my photos and sent some to two local birding experts, with inconclusive results (the photos were not very good, see above). I emailed my birding friend Phil Brown that there was a possible Pacific Golden-Plover out there and went to bed.



The next morning before work, I went back there to try to get better photos, but the bird wasn't there, so off to work I went. But soon, I got emails from Phil from his iPhone that he was seeing the bird and all its pertinent field marks, so I posted to MBB, the local bird sightings email list. After work I went back and enjoyed the bird with Pete and Nancy and was able to see the key Pacific Golden-Plover field mark, the short primary projection, in their scope. I also got some slightly better photos such as the one above.

Sunday morning I went on a Santa Cruz Bird Club field trip to Quail Hollow Ranch led by Alex Rinkert, which was great, with several breeding bird species that I don't see near the coast. After trying for and "dipping" (British for not seeing) on Hermit Warbler at Kathy Kuyper's spot in Henry Cowell, I went back to the scene of my victory, Terrace Point. Alex and Kathy were there and soon Steve Gerow but no golden-plover. I did get to see streams of loons, a Red Phalarope, and some Bonaparte's Gulls.

Over the next couple days, quite a few birders saw and posted the golden-plover. Though it has only happened a couple times, I feel great when other birders "chase" and enjoy a bird first found by me, though Phil was the first to really ID this bird and David Suddjian confirmed the ID. Then, Steve posted that a second Pacific Golden-Plover had joined this first one. The original bird was determined to be a one-year-old just molting into breeding plumage, but the second bird was an adult in full, beautiful breeding plumage!



So, on Friday, May 7th, a week after my initial sighting, I returned to Terrace Point and spent an hour and a half with the two Pacific Golden-Plovers and trying to get some better pictures. The adult in breeding plumage is a strong candidate for the prettiest shorebird I have ever seen (with breeding plumage Red Phalaropes and maybe Red-necked Phalaropes being other strong candidates).



The image above shows the adult plover at top with its black frontparts, and the younger bird below with its golden-specked back. I hope these guys stick around all summer, pleasing me and any other birders who stop by to enjoy them.

San Blas and Puerto Vallarta, February 2010

Almost a year since my trip to Ecuador, February 2010 is time for some kind of vacation.
Day 1, I flew from SFO to Puerto Vallarta, took a taxi to the Hotel Belmar, which is affordable, reasonably nice for the price, and right near the Rio Cuale, but my room was on the 4th floor and they have no elevator. Once I get situated I went to the Isla Cuale to see what birds I could find. One of the first birds I saw was this LITTLE BLUE HERON (below).



I was here a couple years earlier and was able to find Citreoline Trogon, Green Kingfisher and some other goodies. I didn't find those this time, but GRAY-BREASTED MARTINS were flying around with some Barn Swallows. GREAT KISKADEES, GROOVE-BILLED ANIS, RUFOUS-BACKED ROBINS, and NEOTROPIC CORMORANTS were also present here.
I walked down to the Playa de los Muertos. MAGNIFICENT FRIGATEBIRDS are easily seen overhead and BROWN BOOBIES flying by offshore. Down by the pier, as the sun was setting, dozens of birds were begging for handouts, including Brown Pelicans, Snowy Egrets, and Royal and Common Terns (below).



Day 2 I took the public bus a few miles south to Mismaloya. Immediately, I found dozens of YELLOW-WINGED CACIQUES (which I found to be unwilling photo subjects) and soon I heard 4 ORANGE-FRONTED PARAKEETS and was able to get some decent photographs of those (below)


I walked down to the beach (below), along the stream that leads to the beach, was a LOUISIANA WATERTHRUSH, many Great-tailed Grackles (a major "trash bird" of the area), more Groove-billed Anis, a pair of MUSCOVY DUCKS (possibly feral), and waders such as a Green Heron and Great and Snowy Egrets.



In the trees above the road to the beach I was very pleasantly surprised to find an IVORY-BILLED WOODCREEPER and a BAT FALCON perched on a wire that had caught a mouse or some small rodent to eat. Mismaloya is a pleasant, easy-going beach, and going inland from the highway, I found other good birds, such as MASKED TITYRA, SQUIRREL CUCKOO (below),


GREATER PEWEE (below),

and INCA DOVES.

Back in PV, after eating at Planeta Vegetariano, I birded some more along the Rio Cuale. TROPICAL KINGBIRDS are easily seen here, Yellow Warblers were fairly common, with some NASHVILLE WARBLERS, WARBLING VIREOS, and BLUE-GRAY GNATCATCHERS. Another common bird, most places in PV and San Blas, is GOLDEN-CHEEKED WOODPECKER, a beautiful woodpecker that is endemic to Western Mexico (male below)

(and female below)


Day 3 I spent a little more time along the Rio Cuale. Big iguanas can be seen here (below) and are popular among tourists, who seem uninterested in the many beautiful birds that are also present.

I don't know what species of iguana these are or whether they are native. I had read that if you walk inland up the Rio you can get to some good habitat and birds, but I didn't make it very far. I did see a couple CINNAMON HUMMINGBIRDS along here, two ORANGE-FRONTED PARAKEETS, more Yellow and Nashville Warblers, and large numbers of YELLOW-WINGED CACIQUES (finally got a decent picture, below).


I took a taxi to the main Puerto Vallarta bus station, near the airport to catch the bus to San Blas, Nayarit. Apparently, bus schedules are never printed in Mexico or put on the Internet. I had to get the receptionist at my hotel's desk to call the bus station and get the info for the bus. The only bus to San Blas ended up being called the "Norte de Sonora" which was sold at the Pacifico desk via some cooperation with Estrella Blanca. It cost 180 pesos (around $15 US) and took a little over three hours, though Nayarit is in an earlier time zone than Jalisco.

I took a very short taxi ride to my lodgings at Bungalows Casa Roxanna (mid-priced and comfortable). It's only a short walk from there to the waterfront. A kid was throwing some food around, feeding a throng of Brown Pelicans, with Magnificent Frigatebirds circling low overhead (below)

and a BLUE-FOOTED BOOBY was also resting near the jetty (at left in the image below).
I thought the booby might be sick, but it did swim away later toward the ocean.


Day 4
San Blas was "discovered" in the 1960s as an excellent birding location because of the variety of habitats within easy access of the town. Particularly noteworthy in San Blas are the undeveloped mangrove estuaries which attract prodigious quantities of bugs and also birds. For my first morning I walked to area of the cemetery and the old fort and church ruins on a hill that overlooks the town. Along the way I got some good pictures of a SOCIAL FLYCATCHER (below).


The "jejenes" or "no-see-ums" or sand flies for which San Blas is infamous were prevalent at the ruins. I was still able to find some good birds here such as ZONE-TAILED HAWK, (Godman's) SCRUB EUPHONIA, VARIED BUNTING, GREYISH SALTATOR, and a possible GRAYSON'S THRUSH (below).


From the hill near the cemetery I could see that the first couple shrimp ponds on the left across the highway were full of birds, including waders, shorebirds, WOOD STORKS, and ROSEATE SPOONBILLS. So, I walked over there, hoping I could get some access or at least a view. The shrimp pond road didn't have much of a shoulder, so I had to pay close attention to the traffic, but soon enough there was easy walk-in access to the ponds. Typical North American shorebirds were here, a large flock of Blue-winged Teal, and a flock of BLACK SKIMMERS. There were also swallows, and very happily, a MANGROVE SWALLOW perched nearby for a photo (below).

I walked a path with the ponds on my left, mangroves and the road on my right, with some Varied Buntings on the path ahead of me and Tropical and Thick-billed Kingbirds on the telephone lines. Reddish Egret, Tricolored Heron, White Ibis, Great Egret, Snowy Egret, and Great Blue Heron were all present, and eventually several Wood Storks and Roseate Spoonbill (below in takeoff), which were scared into flight by a man hacking weeds with a machete.


The main tourist attraction in San Blas is the boat ride up an estuary to La Tovara, a freshwater spring adjoining a crocodile farm where thousands of birds fly in to roost in the night. The tourist boats go very quickly up the estuary, seeing crocodiles, a few birds, and little else. I needed to get on the birder's version of the boat ride, so I headed to the Hotel Garza Canela, the expensive birder's hotel in San Blas. I met some birders there who agreed to let me go with them on their night boat trip, and I also saw a day-roosting Lesser Nighthawk in the hotel courtyard. Nature photographers enjoy the estuary boat rides because much of the wildlife is very accustomed to the boats and allow close approach. We found an agreeable young American Crocodile (below)
and the SNAIL KITES were especially accommodating (below). Snail Kites and LIMPKINS returned to the San Blas estuaries around the year 2000, because the large snails they eat also returned.


We were very lucky to find a MANGROVE CUCKOO on the boat trip, along with BARE-THROATED TIGER-HERON, ANHINGA (below)
,
RUFOUS-BELLIED CHACHALACA (below), COMMON BLACK-HAWK, and various orioles and warblers.


We stopped to see a sleeping COMMON POTOO along the estuary (below)


and came across a huge flock of Yellow-winged Caciques and also a few COATIMUNDI high in a tree. The night boat trip leaves around 3pm and arrives at La Tovara around dusk. As we neared the spring, the sky turned red, and silhouettes of White and White-faced Ibises flew over us along with Neotropic Cormorants and hundreds of egrets. It was easy for me to imagine the setting as occurring in an ancient world before the arrival of man. A final very special aspect of the night trip is the opportunity to see active Northern Potoos (below).



Day 5
This morning I met up with the birding couple Bob and Gail I had met yesterday to take a morning boat trip up the river with the renowned guide Chencho. Chencho has been leading boat trips for birders in San Blas since the 1970s, and though he can't read or write, he knows the birds very well, and many of their names in English. Chencho pulled the boat into some mangroves and pished in some songbirds including MANGROVE VIREO, the Mangrove form of Yellow Warbler known as MANGROVE WARBLER, and some other warblers such as Tropical Parula, American Redstart, Louisiana Waterthrush, Black-and-White Warbler, and a NORTHERN BEARDLESS-TYRANULLET. But the marquee bird of this trip is the bizarre BOAT-BILLED HERON (below)

which I did not see on the Tovara trip. We also saw large crocodiles (below), Limpkins, Bare-throated Tiger-Herons, and on the way back some peeps and Semipalmated Plovers.


Day 6
I met with Bob and Gail again and a friendly and very inexpensive guide named Francisco Garcia that Hotel Canela Garza had arranged for them and we drove to La Bajada in the early morning for some more upland jungle type birds. Our rental car struggled with the old stone road that leads to the plantations and woodlands, but we did eventually see some great birds including BLACK-THROATED MAGPIE-JAYS, EARED QUETZALS, TUFTED FLYCATCHER, GREENISH ELEANIA, YELLOW GROSBEAK, PALE-BILLED WOODPECKER, PAINTED BUNTINGS, a flyover LILAC-CROWNED PARROT, and several Squirrel Cuckoos. I was unable to get good photos of any these birds, but I did photograph some Erato Heliconian butterflies (below) which are also called Crimson-patched Longwing.

Next, we drove to the crocodile farm, the same one that is next to La Tovara, stopping at a place with good waterbirds including NORTHERN JACANA (immature below), PURPLE GALLINULE, LEAST GREBE, and several types of duck including BLACK-BELLIED WHISTLING DUCK.


The crocodile farm itself, in addition to many crocodiles of different sizes had captive coatimundi, peccaries, and other animals, and unexpectedly some wild, sleeping BOAT-BILLED HERONS in the trees overhead (below twice).



Day 7
I met Francisco early in the morning and we walked toward the San Blas sewer ponds. Some areas on this side of town are muddy, so boots are useful. There are a few small ponds on the way, with Northern Jacanas and Blue-winged Teal evident and maybe a Least Grebe or Yellowlegs, along with the common flycatchers. At the start of the trail to the sewer ponds Francisco heard a RUSSET-CROWNED MOTMOT. I got poor looks at two motmots before they flew away. A few trees later, Francisco heard a CITREOLINE TROGON which was agreeable and photographable (below).

The rest of the trail was fairly birdy with flycatchers, orioles, and the like, plus a BLACK-VENTED ORIOLE (below).


At the sewer ponds themselves, Northern Jacanas were abundant, but hard to get close to, a LAUGHING FALCON was perched in a distant tree, a flock of BLACK-THROATED MAGPIE-JAYS flew through, there were Black-necked Stilts, Spotted Sandpipers, Painted Buntings, one crocodile, several butterflies, and hundreds of mosquitoes. If you stood in exactly the wrong spot there was a foul sewer stink, but otherwise no noticeable stink. At the back of the second pond, Francisco led me past a fallen tree to a shaded area with some fresh water. Birds were abundant here, including SINALOA WREN, MacGillivray's Warbler, American Redstart, Northern Waterthrush, Yellow-breasted Chat, Wilson's Warbler, and Green Kingfisher.

Later, as with most of my afternoons in San Blas, I walked along on my own, taking photos, getting some lunch, and looking for whatever birds I could find. San Blas is a very old town and is pretty run down, especially since Hurricane Kenna in 2002. You can walk around town and find some decent birds in the morning, but the afternoons get pretty darn hot. Findable birds include Painted Bunting, (Cinnamon-rumped) White-collared Seedeater, Sinaloa Crow, Rufous-backed Robin, and Orchard Oriole.

Day 8
My last full day of the trip, I walked toward the beginning of the sewer pond trail on my own, and was happy to find a small flock of MEXICAN PARROTLETS (on wire fence, below).
I was also able to photograph a LINEATED WOODPECKER (below), a BLUE GROSBEAK, a STREAK-BACKED ORIOLE, and Groove-billed Anis.


In the late morning, I met Francisco one last time as we took a boat across to Peso Island. Francisco said the birds here are more timid around people, but that he had found good birds there, even in the late morning. We walked for seemingly five or six miles in sweltering heat, surrounded by mosquitoes. Eventually we did find some decent birds such as Gray Hawk, MacGillivray's and Nashville Warblers, Tropical Parula, and even some poor, fleeting looks at Russet-crowned Motmot and Citreoline Trogon. The only decent photos I got were of a Malachite butterfly (below)

and, back on the beach, an AMERICAN OYSTERCATCHER (below).


Francisco told me that a birder couple he took to La Bajada the day before was scheduled to take the night boat trip with Chencho this evening and that I could probably tag along. So that's what I did. Chencho took us to a spring area first that had some warblers and a male Painted Bunting. We then tried for Rufous-necked Wood-Rail, and heard one, but it wouldn't come out for us to see. The main part of the boat trip was similar to my first one and still very enjoyable. A new bird for me on this trip was RED-BILLED PIGEON, and we also saw Laughing Falcon, Muscovy Duck, Common Paurauque, and Common Yellowthroat.

Day 9
Took a taxi from the bungalow to the bus station, took the bus to Puerto Vallarta, a taxi to the airport (though bus is doable and much cheaper), and flew home. A very successful vacation, perhaps warmer and less relaxing than I would have preferred, but still very different from back home and a worthwhile and affordable escape.