Have been at Falcon State Park for a week. This is where you start seeing pyrrhuloxia (above). They are one of the calmer birds who don’t fly away the minute they see you. An online article said they should have been named desert cardinals rather than pyrrhuloxia.
My first sighting of a northern bobwhite (above). Grackles imitate bobwhite sounds and search through the brush for nests with eggs.
Orange-crowned warblers are very common here.
Yellow-rumped warbler
Ladder-backed woodpecker with peanut butter.
Swamp sparrow
A hispid cotton rat. Looks like a hamster. There is lots of brush for them to hide in. Bobcats have been seen in the area and these rats are something they’d hunt for.
Birds seen in the area, but not pictured: one white-tailed kite, a pair of caracaras, cactus wrens, roadrunners, and several loggerhead shrikes. The shrikes were always perched on barbed wire surrounding private property. They are known for impaling their prey on barbed wire.
Below, a Harris’ hawk and a great kiskadee. I’ll miss seeing the kiskadees as I head north.
