Goodness, goodness! Has it seriously been 2 and a half months since my last post! Man, I've been slacking. Any who, let me make up for that by making this post a good one. On this fine Sunday, my mentor and birding companion from back home (the young birding phenom, Logan Kahle) was making his way up to Humboldt County for the day. Now you guys are certainly asking yourselves: "Why is this 16 year old driving all the way up to Humboldt County from San Francisco for just one day?" Seems ridiculous and borderline deranged. Well one thing you need to understand is that he is doing what is called a "Big Year", throughout the entire state of California. I assume some of you readers have heard of this birding event, whether from just plain birding knowledge, or from the recently released movie "The Big Year", starring comedic legends Steve Martin, Jack Black and Owen Wilson. But for those of you who aren't aware of what this is, a Big Year is when a birder spends an entire calendar year traveling all around a given area (a county, a state, or even country!) to spot the most species of birds as possible. Having been an intensive California birder for the past 8 years, Logan decided it was fine time for him to truly test his knowledge on bird identification and localization by dedicating 2014 to staying within California and to traveling to all corners of the Golden State in search for all the species he could potentially see. He's already at remarkable 240 or so species, which is decent given he's only 2 months in!
So anyways, this still doesn't answer as to what Logan was doing leaving SF at 3:00 AM to get up to Humboldt County. Lately, Humboldt County has been graced with many remarkable vagrants, notably a few that came in the form of raptors. A Gyrfalcon, the world's largest species of falcon, which is regularly found around the Arctic Circle, was sighted near Ferndale, a Long-eared Owl (not a California rarity, but a rare bird for Humboldt County, especially for this time of year) was sighted on the V St. Loop, and last, but most certainly not least, a Black Vulture was sighted in the Ferndale Bottoms, which wound up being only Humboldt's third ever record of one, and the first one in over a decade! With all these tantalizing year ticks, Logan couldn't pass up the opportunity to make a day trip up to our fine redwood-clad, northwestern county. Given the direness of the situation, he first stopped at the Gyrfalcon location before picking me up, because he tried for it the past month to no avail, which rendered him quite irritable and nearly irate as I remembered. Fortunately for him, luck was on his side, and the Peregrine Falcon he was observing in his scope was shortly after disturbed by the large, white falcon he sought after. After a successful hunt, he called me letting me know he was going to pick me up so we could spend the day together. Although, before chasing any of the wayward raptors, he wanted to go on a grouse hunt. The species he was after, Ruffed Grouse, is only found in three California counties (Del Norte, Trinity, and of course Humboldt). Given that he was already up here, he wanted me to bring him to a spot I was told about that where RUGRs were supposedly a given (and I had gone down this road a week before where I found my lifer with Rob Fowler, local birding expert, so I knew this place was promising). Unfortunately, we were unable to stir up this game bird, so Logan dipped on this potential lifer.Our next stop was to chase the Long-eared Owl on the V St. Loop that had been roosting in and frequenting the Sitka Spruces near the Mad River Slough. It had been very reliable, and many people had been able to get inspiring looks and photos of it. This species would have been a lifer for me, so I really wanted this bird to make an appearance. We decided to split up to cover more ground (we were on a tight schedule after all), and if either of us got it, we'd whistle to not frighten the Strigiforme. Sure enough, shortly after splitting up, I hear Logan call my name (the whistling tactic must have just gone right over his head). I come over, and there was the bird, perched and slightly obscured by the branches, but nonetheless stunning. The bird sat there, apparently oblivious to our presence, or so we thought, as it flew off after a few minutes of having it in the scope and snapping a few shots of it. We felt bad about flushing it, because it adds unnecessary stress to the bird's life, and there are too many tales of obsessive photographers flushing these beautiful owls into the clutches of the larger and more predatory Red-tailed Hawks. Fortunately, this one didn't get snagged by a hawk, and so we decided to make a move out of the premises before we caused it anymore stress.
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| Long-eared Owl |
Now came the moment of truth, to find the Black Vulture. Typically found in the southern and eastern states, this bird is lost! So it was essential for Logan to see this bird, for it would make quite an addition to his year list, and not to mention the sheer thrill of seeing such a species so far from its regular range. We arrived at the location in the Ferndale Bottoms, and we began scanning the skies above, searching for Turkey Vulture kettles where it could potentially be associating itself with. As we scanned, I spotted a distant Bald Eagle, a Peregrine Falcon and Logan nailed a gorgeous Ferruginous Hawk fly right above us! But no vulture (of the Black sorts that is, Turkey Vultures galore at this location). We had dedicated a good hour and a half of scanning before we began getting bored of the seeing the same fields and birds around us. I then remembered that a Sandhill Crane had been hanging around one of the fields in the Ferndale Bottoms, and was sighted just the day before. So we decided to go for that bird, which would also have been a good county tick for myself (Logan already had that for the year). As we drove down the road, I immediately spotted it foraging surprisingly close to the road. We got out of the car and snapped a few shots of this crane. This was certainly my closest encounter with this species. My past experiences were either of distant birds congregated in the center of a large field, or of scores of them flying and bugling above me. This bird was a mere 20 feet away, and was quite obliging. As a matter of fact, the bird was so close, I had trouble getting the entire bird in the frame!
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| Sandhill Crane |
In spite of this dip, Logan and I had a great time chasing some good birds, and spending time together and catching up, since we hadn't seen each other since winter break. He got himself a few county ticks, year ticks and even one lifer! (Gyrfalcon). So all in all, his trip was fruitful. And if that weren't enough, he got to bird with a friend from home, away from home, which is always great! Logan still has 10 months of rarity-chasing and California-traveling to go, and he's already off to a good start. I don't think this will be the last time I see in Humboldt County this year, so I will see you soon good friend. Good luck and good birding!
