Field Trip Report: Sagebrush Songbird Nesting Research

Big thanks to Jason for taking us out to his PhD study area in the sagebrush sea and to him and his crew for being such wonderful tour guides! We saw Brewer's Sparrow, Vesper Sparrow, Horned Lark, and Sage Thrasher nests and young at a variety of stages - eggs, nestlings, and fledgings.

It was a beautiful day with larkspur, lupine, bitterroot, and Sego lilies all in bloom. We enjoyed wide-open vistas while being serenaded by cicadas.


 Jason and his eagle-eyed crew showed us how they find sagebrush songbird nests, including the impressive feat of relocating them with just UTMs and a sketch of the area. We successfully tracked down a radio-tagged Brewer’s Sparrow fledgling. They appear to depend heavily on camouflage to keep them safe during this life phase, as the one we tracked sat quietly in a sagebrush shrub while we all got a good look at close range.

We ended the day with Jason banding and placing radio-backpacks on Brewer’s Sparrow nestlings. Despite their tiny size, they were only a few days away from leaving the nest. We all got to take part, with members of the group selecting the bands, preparing them to be placed on the nestlings’ legs, and recording data. 

Upcoming field trip: Songbird research site

by Anika Mahoney

Join us for a day-long field trip to observe and take part in songbird nesting ecology research! UWY PhD candidate Jason Carlisle will take us on a tour of his research sites in the Jeffrey City area.

When: Saturday, June 28 7am - 5pm (or return sooner if in your own vehicle)

Vesper Sparrow. Photo © Shawn Billerman.

What to expect:

• See active nests (likely nestlings by that date, maybe some still on eggs) of Brewer's Sparrow, and likely Sage Thrasher and Vesper Sparrow. 
• See areas mowed this past winter to improve Greater Sage-Grouse habitat.
• See songbird-fledgling-sized radio transmitters and try your hand at radio telemetry. We should have a handful of radioed Brewer's Sparrow fledglings to relocate.
• Beautiful sagebrush steppe!

It's an approximately 3 hour drive from Laramie to Jeffrey City. We will meet at 7am on Saturday, June 28 at Coal Creek Coffee downtown to carpool/caravan.

Please bring: Snacks, lunch, and plenty of water. Be prepared for hot temperatures and variable weather –hats, sunscreen, bug repellant, rain gear, etc.
Optional: Snack/late lunch on the way home at the Split Rock Café in Jeffrey City.

RSVP: Anika Mahoney at laramie.audubon@gmail.com. Minimum group size: 5 participants.

Want to turn this into a weekend trip? Camping is available in Jeffrey City (where Jason’s crew camps in trailers), and the Green Mountain Motel recently reopened here in town.  I'm told it’s clean and costs $55 per night.  The Split Rock Bar/Cafe has food/drink, restrooms, free internet, etc.

June eBird Challenge

Pine Siskin gathering nest material. Cassia County, ID.

Each month the folks at eBird issue a specific data-collection challenge to birders in order to improve the eBird database and our knowledge of birds. This month's challenge is to submit breeding codes with your complete checklists. Time you spend in the field this month will yield valuable information on the timing of breeding, location of breeding, and number of breeding birds. This info can greatly increase our understanding of Wyoming birds in particular, where data is sparse both geographically and temporally.

Savannah Sparrow nest. Churchill, MB.

Contributing breeding bird data is extremely easy: any observation of a singing male, or an adult carrying nest material or food for young, can be noted in an eBird checklist. You don't have to invest a ton of time finding the actual nest--although if you do find a nest, that's awesome because it confirms breeding. A detailed explanation of the breeding codes and how to use them is here. Well worth reading before you start using breeding codes, so that you know which behaviors fall into each category. Also see an example checklist. In that list there are breeding codes for pretty much every species because I'm a huge fan of breeding codes, but breeding info for just a few species is valuable too! Got an American Robin nest in your backyard? eBird it!

Brown Creeper at nest. Lake County, OR.

Northern Pintail nest. Churchill, MB.

All photos © Shawn Billerman

Field trip report: Hutton NWR & Chimney Rock

The hubbub of bird breeding activity was (in my opinion, at least) the highlight of today's field trip to Hutton National Wildlife Refuge and Chimney Rock. We observed nestlings in each of two Ferruginous Hawk nests near Hutton, Black-crowned Night Herons carrying sticks, as well as White-faced Ibises and a Northern Harrier working on nests at Rush Lake. All this plus the Yellow-headed Blackbird philharmonic.

Ferruginous Hawk - Sand Creek Road, Albany Co., WY (photo by Shawn Billerman)

We detected a total of 56 species; links to the eBird checklists for each hotspot and the complete trip list are below.

Birding at Hutton Lake National Wildlife Refuge (photo by Libby Megna)

Chimney Rock (photo by Libby Megna)

Sand Creek Rd
Hutton NWR
Sand Creek Rd again
Chimney Rock area

Species List

Canada Goose Gadwall Mallard Blue-winged Teal Cinnamon Teal Northern Pintail Green-winged Teal Canvasback Redhead Lesser Scaup Ruddy Duck Pied-billed Grebe Eared Grebe Western Grebe Double-crested Cormorant American White Pelican Black-crowned Night-Heron White-faced Ibis Golden Eagle

Northern Harrier Bald Eagle Swainson's Hawk Ferruginous Hawk American Coot American Avocet Killdeer Willet dowitcher sp. Wilson's Phalarope California Gull Forster's Tern Rock Pigeon Common Nighthawk Broad-tailed Hummingbird American Kestrel Common Raven Horned Lark Tree Swallow

Violet-green Swallow Barn Swallow Cliff Swallow Rock Wren Sage Thrasher McCown's Longspur Common Yellowthroat Yellow Warbler Green-tailed Towhee Brewer's Sparrow Savannah Sparrow Song Sparrow Red-winged Blackbird Western Meadowlark Yellow-headed Blackbird Brewer's Blackbird Great-tailed Grackle Brown-headed Cowbird

"MOONBIRD" MAKES ANOTHER APPEARANCE

Migration never ceases to amaze me.... This is from the June Birding Community E-bulletin

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At least one individual Red Knot has traveled from the tip of South America to the top of Canada after passing through the famous stopover site of the Delaware Bay for 21 years. This knot is nicknamed "Moonbird," because the bird has already flown the equivalent distance between the Earth and the moon and more than halfway back during its epic migrations. The bird has been making the trip for over two decades and this spring was observed on 25 May at Reeds Beech, New Jersey, with its identifiable orange-colored leg-band and the number "B-95" on it.

Red Knots feasting on horseshoe crab eggs in Delaware Bay have dropped in numbers from over 100,000 to perhaps under 25,000 in about a dozen years. Not surprisingly the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently announced an extension (to 15 June 2014) for public comment concerning a proposed Threatened listing of the rufa subspecies of the Red Knot under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).

You can read more on Moonbird here.

5th Annual BioBlitz

Red Canyon Ranch, Lander Wyoming | June 21-22 2014

Audubon of the Rockies, The Nature Conservancy, and the UW Biodiversity Institute have partnered to bring together some of the best biologists and naturalists in Wyoming, resulting in an amazing weekend experience just for you! We hope you'll join LAS for the unique opportunity to explore and learn about birds, bats, herps, fish, and more with hands-on activities.

Register by June 7!

The 2014 BioBlitz, held this year in beautiful Red Canyon Ranch, 20 miles south of Lander, Wyoming, will bring together scientists and the public to survey for every type of organism we can find in an area within a couple of days. The BioBlitz will be a 24-hour event in which teams of scientists, teachers, volunteers, environmental educators, and community members join forces to find, identify, and learn about as many local plant, insect and animal species as possible.

Activities include bird mist netting, herp sampling, bee and butterfly identification, plant walks, bat mist netting, small mammal trapping and more!

Full schedule of events and location information.

Join us for part or all of the event. Free, open to the public, & family friendly. PTSB credits available for teachers.

Upcoming trip: Hutton NWR and Chimney Rock

Hoge Lake at Hutton NWR

Join us for a field trip to Hutton Lake National Wildlife Refuge this Saturday, June 7th. We expect to see waterfowl, raptors, songbirds, and more. After Hutton we will head to the Sand Creek/Chimney Rock area to see if we can find nesting Prairie Falcons, Ferruginous Hawks, or Golden Eagles. Along the way, we'll stop by a small wetland where we heard a Veery call last year. Former Laramie Audubon president and professional bird tour leader, Tim Banks, is back in Laramie and will lead this outing.

Meet downtown at Coal Creek (110 Grand Ave) at 8 am to caffeinate and carpool. All Laramie Audubon field trips are free and open to the public; families are welcome. Bring water and snacks, field guide(s), binoculars, spotting scope if you have one, and dress for the worst weather. Gas up ahead of time. This trip will last several hours but if you have your own vehicle, you may leave any time you want.

Volunteers needed for nightjar surveys

We will be conducting our yearly nightjar surveys between June 5 – 19, 2014.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with this effort, the Laramie Audubon Society participates in a National Nightjar Survey that was initiated in 2007 by the Center for Conservation Biology. Nightjars are enigmatic, nocturnally-active birds whose populations are thought to be declining throughout North America. Wyoming has two species of nightjars: Common Nighthawk and Common Poorwill.

Common Nighthawk. Photo by Kenneth Schneider (Flickr, CC)

In 2009, Laramie Audubon adopted five survey routes in the vicinity of Laramie and we have been surveying these routes once a year ever since. The night surveys are fairly easy and quite enjoyable. Surveys take no more than two hours and consist of making 10 stops along an established route. At each stop, we count the number of nightjars heard during a 6-minute period and fill out our observations on a data sheet. It is important to have good hearing to conduct these surveys. Surveys have to take place on a relatively clear night when the moon is more than 50 percent full and when there is not too much wind (these requirements can be challenging for the Laramie area!). Surveys begin at least 30 minutes after sunset and must be completed after moonrise and before moonset. You can do the surveys alone, but it’s easier to work in teams.

If you are interested in participating in these surveys please e-mail me. For those who would like to participate, I will explain the protocols and data collection, and hand out data sheets, sunset/moonrise/moonset times, and survey route maps on Tuesday June 3rd at 6 pm in the University of Wyoming Student Union, at the seating area across from the information booth on the main level. If you cannot make this training time but would like to participate, please e-mail to set up an alternate time to meet me.

Common Poorwill. Photo by Andy Teucher (Flickr, CC)

Thanks to those who decide to participate and let’s hope the weather cooperates this year!

Sophie Osborn

P.S. For those who prefer hiking and doing daytime bird surveys, we will be conducting our annual Brown-capped Rosy-Finch survey on July 12, 2014 this year. More information about that survey to come soon...

Laramie Hotspots Field Trip Report

The weather for our trip today was great and despite a relatively slow morning bird-wise, we had
excellent views of colorful neotropical migrants and spent some quality time learning to identify birds by their songs. Highlights were a male Rose-breasted Grosbeak at Greenhill Cemetery, a singing Veery at Optimist Park, and dark-morph Swainson's Hawks at Optimist Park and Greenhill Cemetery. We detected a total of 44 species; links to the eBird checklists for each hotspot and the complete trip list are below.

Optimist Park/Greenbelt
LaBonte Park
Greenhill Cemetery

Species List
Canada Goose
Double-crested Cormorant
Turkey Vulture
Swainson's Hawk
American Avocet
Spotted Sandpiper
Wilson's Phalarope
California Gull
Forster's Tern
Rock Pigeon
Eurasian Collared-Dove
Mourning Dove
Downy Woodpecker
Western Kingbird
American Crow
Common Raven
Northern Rough-winged Swallow
Tree Swallow
Barn Swallow
Cliff Swallow
Mountain Chickadee
Red-breasted Nuthatch
House Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Veery
Swainson's Thrush
American Robin
Gray Catbird
European Starling
Cedar Waxwing
Yellow Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Song Sparrow
Western Tanager
Rose-breated Grosbeak
Black-headed Grosbeak
Red-winged Blackbird
Common Grackle
Brown-headed Cowbird
Bullock's Oriole
House Finch
Pine Siskin
American Goldfinch
House Sparrow

Book talk by Jackie Canterbury

Join us next Wednesday, May 28th, for our last evening program of the spring season. Dr. Jackie Canterbury, co-author of Birds and Birding in Wyoming's Bighorn Mountains Region, will give a talk followed by a book signing. Her book was published last fall and contains the most up-to-date information on the distribution and breeding status of bird species found in the Bighorns. Birds and Birding also explains the Bighorns' ecology, geology, and birding locations.

The talk will be held at the Berry Center in conjunction with the University of Wyoming's Biodiversity Institute. The reception will begin at 6:30 pm and Dr. Canterbury's talk will begin at 7:00 pm. This event is open to the public.

Birds and Birding in Wyoming is available for purchase or free download here.

LAS field trip to Hereford Ranch, Cheyenne, WY

Eastern Screech-Owl. Photo © Julie Hart

It’s not every day that you see an Eastern Screech Owl and a Red-headed Woodpecker, but the twelve participants on Laramie Audubon’s May 17, 2014 trip to the Hereford Ranch, near Cheyenne, were treated to spectacular views of both of these species as well as 54 others. The rain that was forecast held off, the sky cleared, and the birds cooperated. While we didn’t see any orioles, vireos, or quite the warbler diversity we expected, we all enjoyed the colors, songs, and avian activity that were on display at Hereford.

Bird list:
Mallard 
Great Blue Heron 
Turkey Vulture 
Broad-winged Hawk

Photo © Julie Hart

Swainson's Hawk 
Red-tailed Hawk 
Spotted Sandpiper 
Eurasian Collared-Dove 
Mourning Dove 
Eastern Screech-Owl 
Belted Kingfisher 
Red-headed Woodpecker 
Downy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker 
American Kestrel 
Empidonax sp. 
Say's Phoebe 
Western Kingbird 
Blue Jay 
Black-billed Magpie 
Northern Rough-winged Swallow 
Barn Swallow 
Cliff Swallow 
Red-breasted Nuthatch 
House Wren 
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher 
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 
Townsend's Solitaire 
Veery 
Swainson's Thrush 
American Robin 
Gray Catbird 
Brown Thrasher
European Starling 
Northern Waterthrush 
Common Yellowthroat 
Yellow Warbler 
Yellow-rumped Warbler 
Wilson's Warbler 
Yellow-breasted Chat 
Green-tailed Towhee 
Chipping Sparrow 
Clay-colored Sparrow 
Lark Sparrow 
Lincoln's Sparrow 
White-crowned Sparrow 
Western Tanager 
Lazuli Bunting 
Red-winged Blackbird 
Western Meadowlark 
Yellow-headed Blackbird 
Common Grackle 
Brown-headed Cowbird 
House Finch 
American Goldfinch 
House Sparrow 

Greenbelt/LaBonte/Greenhill Tour of Laramie Hotspots, Saturday, May 24, 8:00 am

Photo by Rick Leche (Creative Commons, Flickr)

Join Laramie Audubon Society for a walk along the Laramie Greenbelt on Saturday, May 24, 2014. Meet at Coal Creek Coffee, downtown Laramie, at 8:00 am to caffeinate and carpool.  Many new summer residents and spring migrants can be found on the Greenbelt along the Laramie River.

After the Greenbelt, if time and stamina permits, we will head to LaBonte Park in Laramie, where the lake hosts migrating waterfowl and shorebirds.  Then it's off to the Greenhill Cemetery next to UW Campus where tall evergreens abound.

Call Sophie for more information.  307-742-6138.