Migration Photo Dump

Given that the recent material on this blog has covered events from over a month ago, you may begin to think that the birding has stopped.  Any birder will tell you the birding never stops.  Since returning from Montana, there has been a lot of local action as I’ve tried to keep up with migration while blogging, holding down a job, being a dad/husband, etc. Anyhow, here is post that will largely be pictorial with some commentary as needed.  The birds pictured will follow the taxonomic order of how birds are listed with ornithologists unions, eBird, etc.  This is not an exhaustive run-down of all the birds I’ve seen this spring, but rather just the more photogenic ones. Some are migrants; some are residents who have returned for the breeding season.

Waterfowl

Trumpeter Swan

Trumpeter Swan

Wood Duck

Wood Duck

Mallards

Mallards

Blue-winged Teal and Wood Duck

Blue-winged Teal and Wood Duck

Greater Scaup

Greater Scaup

Lesser Scaup

Lesser Scaup

Lesser Scaup and Greater Scaup

Lesser Scaup and Greater Scaup

Herons, Ibis, and Allies

About a month ago, I traveled to Miller-Richter WMA in Yellow Medicine County to join forces with my birding friend, Garrett Wee, to look for my lifer Willet and Short-billed Dowitcher.  Willets had been popping up left and right, but somehow I was always in the middle.  This day with Garrett would prove to be the same.  As we studied the shorebirds on Miller Lake, Garrett and I got talking about White-faced Ibises.  He was telling me how it was probably his favorite bird.  He’s seen them in southern states but never here in Minnesota.  White-faced Ibis is a rare-regular bird for MN.  He missed the group of five last year in his home county at Black Rush Lake because he was at prom.  Fair enough I suppose.

Our next stop after Miller-Richter was Spellman and Miedd Lakes.  Right away at Miedd, Garrett spotted some birds faraway on the opposite shore that looked different.  I zoomed my camera to the max and snapped a crummy photo so Garrett and I could see what they were.  Even though it was super blurry, we could tell by the coloration and sheen on the wings that they were Ibises! We immediately hoofed it nearly 3/4 of a mile around the shoreline to get a closer view.  And there were eight birds in all! It was awesome that Garrett got his Minnesota White-faced Ibises on the very day we talked about it.  As a bonus, no one has ever submitted an official MOU record of White-faced Ibises for Yellow Medicine County.

White-faced Ibises

White-faced Ibises

White-faced Ibises

Shorebirds

Spotted Sandpiper

Spotted Sandpiper

Least Sandpiper

Least Sandpiper

Pectoral Sandpiper

Pectoral Sandpiper

Long-billed Dowitcher

Long-billed Dowitcher

Wilson's Phalarope

Wilson’s Phalarope

Owls

Great Horned Owl

Great Horned Owl

Kingfishers

Belted Kingfisher

Belted Kingfisher

Vireos

Yellow-throated Vireo

Yellow-throated Vireo

Gnatcatchers

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher

Catbirds, Mockingbirds, and Thrashers

I’ve been on very good terms with Brown Thrashers this spring.  It’s a balm of sorts for the Sage Thrasher burn.

Brown Thrasher

Brown Thrasher

Wood-Warblers

Don’t let the lack of photos fool you; I’ve seen a great variety of Warblers this spring.  They just haven’t been very photogenic.  Best non-pictured species included Golden-winged, Canada, Magnolia, and Northern Parula.  American Redstarts are resident this far south in the summer, and they have been especially ubiquitous during migration.

American Redstart

American Redstart

This next photo is included only because it is a photographic first and only the third time I have seen a Bay-breasted Warbler.  Thanks for the call, Steve.

Bay-breasted Warbler

Bay-breasted Warbler

Sparrows and other Emberizids

Field Sparrow

Field Sparrow

Savannah Sparrow

Savannah Sparrow

Harris's Sparrow

Harris’s Sparrow

Blackbirds

Baltimore Oriole

Baltimore Oriole

Other Cool Stuff

Snapping Turtle

Snapping Turtle

There are two special birds I have left out of this post.  Both are big birds and both are BIG birds.  One was just a county bird; the other was a county/life bird.  These birds will either be combined in the next post or each have their own post. Stay tuned!

None Greater–The Story of Our Sage-Grouse Lifer (The Epilogue – Bonus Lifers and Other Good Birds)

When I planned the trip to Montana to see Greater Sage-Grouse with my dad, I had blinders on.  I was fixated on one bird and rightly so considering its significance.  Somewhere along the way, even as I was making birding plans for Arizona and a late winter trip to northern MN, curiosity got the best of me regarding central Montana. I began to wonder what other cool birds we could get.  Studying eBird bar charts for the Billings area, I started to realize there was a unique chunk of birds we could add to our life lists that would be difficult to find where we normally bird in MN and AZ. The prospect of bonus lifers was indeed exciting.  Not only could we pick up life birds, but we could pick up all kinds of other western goodies as well.  In both regards we were successful and had a lot of fun.  Here’s the run-down.

Good Non-Lifer Western Birds

1. Say’s Phoebe – still need one in MN and therefore still like seeing them everywhere else, even if that’s at a rest stop on I-94.

Say's Phoebe

2. Sharp-tailed Grouse – I’ve seen and shot my fill; a quick interstate sighting filled any remaining Sharptail void for the time being.

3. American Avocet – I’ve got better photos in the archives. This is probably the only shot I’ll get at seeing them for 2015, so it’s getting posted.

American Avocet

4. Swainson’s Hawk – If the big sky and rugged terrain don’t remind you that you’re out west, freeway fly-overs of this raptor will.

5. Mountain Bluebird – even when it’s a blur, this bird is a welcome flash of color on the monochrome landscape of early spring.

Mountain Bluebird

6. Burrowing Owl – never, ever gets old.  Hunting for them among the similar-sized, shaped, and colored prairie dogs in a dog town is a fresh take on owling.  The challenge is accentuated by the whack-a-mole behavior of both species.

Evan Burrowing Owl

Burrowing Owl

John Carlson, the facilitator of our Sage-Grouse adventure, told us that he worries that people who shoot Prairie Dogs for sport may inadvertently shoot Burrowing Owls – a terrible, but possible scenario.

Burrowing Owl

John also pointed out the vocalizations of Burrowing Owls.  I’ve seen several Burowing Owls in Arizona, but I’ve never heard one before.  It was pretty cool and distinctive.  You can bet I’ll be listening for that sound whenever I bird in western Minnesota.

7. Ferruginous Hawk – perhaps an even a better western hawk than Swainson’s Hawk and one heckuva a mother, finding time to rear a brood and decorate.  The word ‘nesting’ to describe the preparatory behavior of expectant mothers was taken from this bird’s efforts.

Ferrugionous Hawk

I never noticed the trash and Christmas lights until I got home and looked at my photos.  It’s not like someone left them on this tree, either.  We were in the middle of nowhere. John had spotted this nest for us and asked us if we wanted to see a Ferruginous Hawk nest.  I asked him later if he had this nest scoped out from a previous trip, and he told us it was his first time seeing this particular nest–he said a nest in a lone, short tree on the prairie was typical for this species.

Ferruginous Hawk

John then spotted the male nearby.

Ferruginous HawkIt was fun to see the male exhibiting the behavior described in the field guide, which is sitting out in the open on the ground and always in a perfect western setting.

Ferruginous Hawk

8. Western Meadowlark – a regular sight back home in MN, but a crazy ubiquitous sight out West.  I have never seen more Meadowlarks.  Therefore, the law of large numbers in birding says that eventually even I will get a good photo of one.  And considering this is Dad’s favorite bird from his childhood days on the North Dakota prairie, I had to post some photos of this bird from our special trip.

Western Meadowlark

Their song is beautiful and could be heard constantly from all directions.

Western Meadowlark

It is the song that my Dad enjoys most about them. Have a listen for yourself.

The only thing better than that is watching my dad’s favorite bird photo-bomb his research bird, singing the whole time.

The Bonus Lifers

1. Sage Thrasher – we saw one. Barely. John pointed out a bird that flew away.  Since we were still on the hunt for Greater Sage-Grouse, we didn’t take time to poke around for it.  It was positively identified by John and seen by us–those are the minimum requirements for a lifer but by no means make for a satisfying lifering experience.  It was an upgrade from a similar sighting with Laurence Butler in the Sonoran Desert last year; in that situation Laurence was pretty sure a bird that flew by was a Sage Thrasher.  We held off on counting it then.  It’s counted now, but better looks are required in the future.

2. California Gull – a very good-looking Gull with that dark eye and red orbital ring.  John found us a smattering of them at the Yellow Water Reservoir in the Yellow Water Triangle where Dad worked in the 1970s.

California Gull

Seeing this Gull has given me confidence in knowing what to look for when we comb through the hundreds of Ring-billed and Herring Gulls at the county landfill back home in hopes of finally turning up a county record.

California Gull

3. Chestnut-collared Longspur – a lifer for Evan.  This is a tough, tough bird in Minnesota.  Last year Steve Gardner and I traveled to Felton Prairie to successfully track down one of only a handful of birds in the whole state.  Here in central Montana, where there are seas of prairie grass, they are way more common.

Chestnut-collared Longspur

Chestnut-collared LongspurI don’t recall the name of the road we traveled where we saw this Chestnut-collared Longspur, but whatever it’s called, I’ve dubbed it Longspur Road.

Longspur Road

Why Longspur Road?

4. McCown’s Longspur – gobs upon gobs of this hoped-for bird were seen pecking grit off the road in the 40 mph wind. We literally saw hundreds.  John figures we were witnessing a large migration movement and not just birds on territory.

McCown's Longspur

This Longspur has such a limited range in the west/central part of the U.S. with most of its summer territory being in Montana.  Not only were we in the right part of the country, but we were there at the right time of year to see these awesome Longspurs in their breeding plumage.

McCown's Longspur

McCown's Longspur

5. Long-billed Curlew – this was another hoped-for bird that is a summer resident to the grasslands of the Great Plains.  I had the pleasure of spotting this lifer myself as this strange-looking creature seemed out of place as it strolled through the grassland interspersed with sagebrush.

Long-billed Curlew

It seemed so bizzare to see this giant shorebird out in the sea of grass and sage with no water in sight.  It reminded me of seeing the resident Marbled Godwits at Felton Prairie back in Minnesota.Long-billed CurlewWe ended up seeing a second Curlew a little later, but neither were very photogenic.

We had a couple life bird misses, but no one is complaining here.  In addition to the big lifer of the Greater Sage-Grouse, Evan picked up five additional lifers and I picked up four new ones.  These birds were the icing on an already delicious cake.

The Ducks of North Dakota

On our way back home, we again spent the night in Bismarck.  The next day I decided to make a quick stop east of town to look for some reported Hudsonian Godwits.  There were no Godwits around, but one thing North Dakota is never short on is ducks.  Certainly this state has to have the highest duck to person ratio in the nation.  Try to not see a duck in North Dakota.  The highlight duck for me was seeing hundreds of Northern Pintails.  They are usually just a single digit bird back home and seen only during migration. Despite their numbers, I had trouble finding any that weren’t shy for photos.

Northern Pintail

With thousands of ducks you’re bound to get a good photo opportunity or two, even if they are common species like the Gadwall and Blue-winged Teal.

Gadwall

Blue-winged Teal

Blue-winged Teal

Shenanigans in Minnesota

On our trip, we saw three giant bird statues: Sandy, the 40-ft tall Sandhill Crane in Steele, ND; the world’s largest American Crow in Belgrade, MN; and the world’s largest Greater Prairie Chicken in Rothsay, MN.  In hindsight, I should have stopped at all three for photo ops, but at least we made the stop in Rothsay.  We were on a Grouse high after our big trip, so it only seemed fitting that we should stop for this one.  It wasn’t long before this trip that we were birding in Arizona with Tommy DeBardeleben and learning to inject more fun in our outings.

Greater Prairie Chicken EvanThis next photo was not completely orchestrated by me.  Evan really did discover the lesser end of a Greater Prairie Chicken all on his own.  The smiles are 100% natural. Oh, to be 8 again.

Evan Greater Prairie Chicken

Here’s one the grandmas can approve of.

Evan Greater Prairie Chicken

After seeing Greater Sage-Grouse do their mating display, Evan and I decided it would be fun to reserve one of the Minnesota DNR’s blinds this upcoming spring to watch booming Greater Prairie Chickens near Rothsay.  And eventually, I’d like to see all the Grouse species do their respective, springtime mating rituals.  There is no better way to see Grouse.

As our trip was drawing to a rapid close as we were racing to get back in time for a piano lesson, we squeezed in one more quick stop.  We simply had to.

Evan Evansville

This was a monumental trip for Evan and me filled with good memories, great birds, and new and old friends. There will no doubt be more birding adventures, both little and grand, but none will top this. I hope you enjoyed tagging along through these posts.

The story of our Montana Greater Sage-Grouse Lifer with Rick Wallestad is made up of four parts: 1) The Prologue–The Impetus, 2) Part 1, 3) Part 2, and 4) The Epilogue–Bonus Lifers.

“The Sagebrush Sea” — TONIGHT!

The timing couldn’t be more perfect–tonight at 7:00 CST on PBS be sure to check out “The Sagebrush Sea,” a documentary by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology on the vast sagebrush land and its inhabitants.  The Greater Sage-Grouse will play a prominent role in this film.  If you want to see what Evan and I got to watch live last month with Dad, be sure to tune in tonight!  Special thanks to readers Shalese Sands and Brad Nelson for the heads up on this documentary.

Cornell’s Trailer

PBS’s Trailer

P.S. I’m almost done with the Epilogue to our Montana Sage-Grouse trip which highlights all our bonus lifers and other cool birds from the Sagebrush Sea or Big Empty.

To read the story about our recent Montana Greater Sage-Grouse Lifer with my dad, Rick Wallestad, who researched Sage-Grouse in the 1970s, check out the following:  1) The Prologue–The Impetus, 2) Part 1, 3) Part 2, and 4) The Epilogue–Bonus Lifers.

None Greater–The Story of Our Sage-Grouse Lifer (Part 2 of 2)

All that separated months of planning and anticipation from our biggest lifer was the chasm of a few hours of restless sleep. Finally, after multiple disappointing checks of the clock through the night, 3:00 was here.  It was go time! As is usually the case for big events like this, Evan was easy to wake up.  Before long the three of us were out of the house and at our rendezvous point with John Carlson and Charlie Eustace on the north side of Billings.

It was a nice addition to have dad’s former colleague, Charlie, along with us.  Since Charlie had obligations later that day, he drove separately up to Lavina.  Dad seized the opportunity to catch up with his old friend and fellow biologist by hopping in with Charlie.  Meanwhile, Evan and I rode up with John for the 45-minute ride in the darkness.  Evan dozed in and out of sleep, but John and I were wide awake and excitedly talking birds, amped up by the adventure that was about to happen.  In no time, we were at Lavina where we picked up Dad and Charlie.  In minutes we were off the tar and on East Red Hill Road which would take us to the lek that John had selected for us.  As John drove through the desolate sagebrush country in the dark, Charlie entertained us with one more story from Dad’s former days with the Fish & Game Department.  I knew that cell phone technology originated in the 70s, but what I did not know was that Dad had one of the first ones.  He used it to call into field offices when he was out doing research.  According to Charlie, Dad was only the second person in Montana who had a cell phone at the time.  When the other person, the *ahem* Governor, found out he did not have exclusive rights to this cutting-edge technology and that a lowly field biologist also had a cell phone, the governor’s ego was greatly bruised. And as a result, my dad, like so many students in my classroom over the years, got his phone taken away. Charlie laughed and laughed (and so did we) as he told the story.

Don’t ask me how, but John eventually discerned our stopping point in the darkness along East Red Rill Road.  He confirmed the location by checking his GPS.  Many life birds are happenstance.  Many are searched for and sought out. This one was pinpointed down to the degree, minute, and second–a field technician that works under John had placed a blind in the optimal viewing location for the lek and then given John the coordinates.  John took off walking into the black, sagebrush abyss armed only with a headlamp and his GPS.  John still had to set up the blind that was waiting for us somewhere out in the middle of nowhere. As he walked, we could hear him flushing Sage-Grouse off the lek, which he told us would happen.  I’ve flushed many, many gamebirds over the years, but I could tell that these sounded different.  They sounded bigger.

The rest of us gathered our things and then went in the direction of John’s headlamp.  Setting out into utter darkness distorts the perception of distance.  It felt like we had walked a mile, but in reality it was probably a quarter mile or so.  I’ll never forget taking a look back to the east where the sun was still well below the horizon but already showing the contours of the hills as a bright orange line that stretched as far as you could see.  Even in the darkness, you could tell we were in Big Sky country.

We eventually made it out to John who was finishing setting up the blind which is no easy task under optimal conditions, let alone when it’s dark and there is a strong wind.  Once we were out there, we realized that we were a couple chairs short, so I went back to John’s Suburban to get more.  On my hike back, I flushed about a dozen Sage-Grouse.  All were heard-only flushes until three birds flushed in front of me giving me my life look as large, long-tailed silhouettes illuminated by the orange glow to the east.  Awesome.  Once I made it back to the blind, the task was now to get the four of us inside. John opted to go view a different lek since we couldn’t all fit in the blind. None of us knew where the door was or how it operated, so everybody shimmied underneath the walls to get inside.  Only afterward in the daylight hours did I realize there were cacti all over the place.  But the four of us eventually got inside and got situated as best we could as human sardines.

Once the rustling stopped and we all could sit still, it didn’t take long to hear the popping sound of the Sage-Grouse doing their crazy, head-bobbing, air-sac pumping display.  It is an eery sound that could be heard all around us.  I never realized until just a year ago that they did this dynamic motion and made this unearthly noise.  Utter darkness slowly transitioned into a dimly lit landscape finally allowing us to see monstrous blobs on the landscape.  And they were close. Eventually we could make out the large, white collars of the birds and see them as they thrust their heads while popping out their two large, yellow air-sacs.  Evan and I had the front row and were excitedly looking to see more and more birds being revealed as the light began turning silhouettes into our target.  It was so cool to finally be here, seeing this bird, and seeing it in just this way with just the right company.  Here is the first photo that I took, which was quite awhile after we had started seeing and hearing the birds.  It gives you a sense of the mystique of seeing these incredible birds when it is just light enough to discern your own hands out of the darkness.

Greater Sage-GrouseEven though the sun wasn’t up high enough for good photos, we were fascinated by what was going on all around us.  Not only did we have roughly 30 males in front of us, but we could hear another large group of Sage-Grouse behind us–right where we had walked through.  Sunrise was still a ways off, but the light was finally good enough to get some pictures.

Greater Sage-Grouse

Greater Sage-Grouse

John told us that the black, hair-like feathers at the back of the neck are called filoplumes.

Greater Sage-Grouse

The Snowy Mountains which were living up to their namesake on this day made a nice backdrop for watching displaying Greater Sage-Grouse.Greater Sage-GrouseThe birds pictured above were all fairly close in front of us, to the west and north.  Behind us to the southeast we could finally make out the more distant birds as the light increased.  This group was close to 40 birds!  Here you can see how the Sage-Grouse choose a flat area with no sagebrush for their courtship display.

Greater Sage-GrouseDad told us that, despite all these males, only one or two will mate with all the hens.  They are competing and working their hardest to be that stud.  The group of hens will work their way onto the lek and then choose the candidate with the best genetic makeup, determined by whomever puts on the best display.  Below you can see two hens sitting by the stud of this lek.  Dad, being the biologist he is, was not entranced and distracted like we were by the myriad of males simultaneously doing their strut all around us.  Instead he knew what to look for and was watching intently through his binoculars for copulation which he saw and then announced to the rest of us.

Greater Sage-Grouse lek

You will see this later in the video at the end of this post, but these males do their air-sac pumping display, pivot, and then do it over again in a different direction.  Undoubtedly they are broadcasting their sound in all directions in an effort to attract the attention of the hens. If you compare the above photo to the photo below taken just a couple seconds later, you will see how some of the males are facing a new direction.  You will also see birds at different stages in the very rapid air-sac pumping display.Greater Sage-Grouse lek

Dad taught us how the birds on the periphery of the main strutting area are the juvenile birds.  In fact, some of these juveniles are relegated to do their strutting off the lek in the most undesirable of all places, the sagebrush itself.  Occasionally one of these young bucks would test his mettle and wander through the main part of the strutting ground only to be chased off by the big boys.  This never failed to elicit laughter from Dad and Charlie.  It was fascinating to observe all these things Dad has talked about for years which were fairly abstract concepts to us until this point.

In addition to watching the courtship and mating antics, photography was also a priority for me, so I turned my attention back to the closer birds and eagerly awaited the sun to peak over the horizon.  That didn’t stop me from photographing as I waited, though.  This photo was as close as I got to capturing the split-second where the air-sacs are fully deployed.

Greater Sage-Grouse

Greater Sage-Grouse

I was eager to get the photo above in the perfect morning sun which was coming in just a couple minutes.  That wasn’t in the cards, though.  Dad and Charlie started discussing what we’d do in the cramped blind if someone had to relieve himself.  Then, after months of planning and careful preparation, I realized I made a fateful mistake: I did not make sure Evan went to the bathroom that morning.  All the talk of waterworks was enough for Evan to realize this now too.  I told him to quietly slip under the back corner of the blind (we still hadn’t found the door) so the close birds wouldn’t spook.  When he was successfully out without flushing any Grouse, I whispered for him to go right next to the blind so he was still out of view of the birds. Well, he didn’t understand what I was saying and tromped out about 15 feet.  That was it.  The birds got out of there in a hurry.

Hope was not gone, though, as the two most prominent males held their ground.  There were girls on the line, after all, or so they thought.  Their thunder was gone, though, as they slowly started to realize there were no females to impress and no young whipper-snappers to beat off their turf.  There was nothing to get pumped up for–literally or figuratively.

Greater Sage-Grouse

They instead mailed it in and pretended to still care by doing a non-threatening stand-off– in perfect light.

Greater Sage-Grouse

It turns out that Evan just accelerated what would have happened naturally anyway.  Moments after this picture was taken, a Golden Eagle came in low and scared these two birds off also.

Golden Eagle

The Eagle then flew directly over the blind just 30 feet up, giving us our best looks ever at this species.  I could see the golden nape with my naked eye. We watched out the back window of the blind as the Eagle proceeded to fly over the larger group of Sage-Grouse to our rear.  Instantly they all took off, and the show was completely over.  The time of day was 7:00.

I called up John so he could come and get us.  We had a good 15 minutes to wait for him to show up, so we packed up the blind and chairs and started trekking back to East Red Hill Road.

L-R: Charlie and Dad

L-R: Charlie and Dad

It was a fast, intense morning and much shorter than I hoped.  For Dad it was probably just about right.  Having seen this bird and this courtship display many times he had said that viewing Sage-Grouse from a blind for a few hours might be overkill.  I disagree, but then again, I also haven’t spent as many cold, dark mornings in the sagebrush-covered landscape as he has!  But for me, there’s not enough sagebrush or its Grouse in my life.

Snowy Mountains

Once John arrived, we took some time for some group shots to commemorate the morning’s outing. In the distance we could hear male Sage-Grouse firing it up again in the places to which they had dispersed.

The old biologists: Rick Wallestad and Charlie Eustace

The old  biologists: Rick Wallestad and Charlie Eustace  -Photo courtesy of John Carlson

L-R: Dad, Me, Evan, John Carlson, Charlie Eustace

L-R: Dad, Me, Evan, John Carlson, Charlie Eustace

Since the day was still very young even though we’d been up for four hours, we went to the smaller lek on Emory Road that John had been viewing that morning to see if any of those birds were still around.  On the way we dropped Charlie off at his car in Lavina and said our goodbyes to him.

As we cruised down Emory I was watching for Sage Thrashers when I was startled to see a few Greater Sage-Grouse in full display mode on the left side of the road.  John told us we were very near the lek he was at, so these birds had probably just come from there. I was happy to have a second chance at photographing them.

Greater Sage-Grouse

Greater Sage-Grouse

Greater Sage-Grouse

One of the protective efforts landowners and government agencies are taking to conserve  Greater Sage-Grouse is to mark fences near active leks.  When the Sage-Grouse fly into the lek in the pre-dawn, they have been known to be killed by collisions with barb-wire fences.  John explained that these markers are meant to reflect the light from the rising sun, helping the Grouse see the fence and avoid hitting it.  So, if you are out West in sagebrush country and you see these white markers, you are likely near a Greater Sage-Grouse lek.  According to the pamphlet I picked up at the Montana FWP office, only fences in high-risk areas are marked, which is 6-14% of all fences in Sage-Grouse habitat.  These marked fences can reduce collisions by 83%.

Fences in high-risk areas of Sage-Grouse habitat are marked to reduce collisions.

Fences in high-risk areas of Sage-Grouse habitat are marked to reduce collisions.

After enjoying these bonus Sage-Grouse for a bit as well as some other fun birds, we headed up to an area north of Roundup known as the Yellow Water Triangle.  This is the area where Dad conducted his research on Greater Sage-Grouse in the 1970s.  We were going to tour it and hopefully see some Sage-Grouse there as well, though it was getting to be too late in the morning for birds to still be on leks.

Dad brought one of his original maps along so he could point things out.  It’s a pretty cool relic.

Yellow Water Triangle mapI believe the circles mark locations of leks, which Dad always called strutting grounds, that he knew of in the 1970s.

Yellow Water Triangle

As we drove through the trails on the BLM land, Dad would tell us when we’d go by an area where he had a lek.  Sure enough, the barb wire fences were marked with the white markers, meaning that birds are likely still using those grounds today, nearly 40 years after Dad worked in this area.

In retrospect I wish we would have taken more time to get out of the vehicle and explore some of these places, but the ferocious winds (40 mph!) were making for a miserable day for being outside and taking pictures.  About the only picture I got of the landscape of the Yellow Water Triangle was in this picture I took of a buck Antelope.

Antelope

Pictures or not, it was nice to see this land where Dad spent so much time as a younger man than myself.  He was my age when he left the Fish & Game for the entrepreneurial life.  Now I at least have a frame of reference for the stories Dad has told and likely will retell. John Carlson told me later by email that he really enjoyed driving Dad through the Triangle and hearing his reactions to how the landscape has changed.

The rest of the day we continued to drive around central Montana on the quest for more life birds that are resident birds in this area.  We were quite successful in that regard, but I’ll save all that for the epilogue to the Greater Sage-Grouse story.  In reality, those birds were just icing on the best and most memorable bird trip we’ve done.  I want to send out a huge thank you to John Carlson who facilitated the whole thing, making it an effortless and remarkable experience.

The Feather Story

When we were riding in John’s Suburban after our successful Sage-Grouse viewing, John gave Evan a special Sage-Grouse feather he found that morning.  This feather is one of those black feathers with the white tips that you see on the back side of the fanned-tail.  Several can be seen in the photos above.  Evan cherished this gift from John, but like a typical 8 year-old, he wasn’t too careful about storing it in the vehicle.  He’s usually pretty good about always knowing where his stuff is, so I didn’t think much of it.

Late that night, long after our 12-hour birding adventure was over, I was finally tucking Evan in to bed to get some sleep before our return trip the next day.  It was at this time that he broke down sobbing telling me how at one point when we all had the windows down looking at birds, his special feather blew out the window (remember the 40 mph wind?).  The kid was inconsolable.

That next morning I was planning to do some more Montana birding before we left for Bismarck where we’d again be spending the night.  I was considering everything from looking for an American Dipper down at Red Lodge to going back to Lavina to try to get video of the Greater Sage Grouse–an opportunity I didn’t get because our time with the Grouse was cut short.  Anyhow, when I heard Evan crying his heart out, I knew what I’d do.  I’d head back to Lavina to view the Sage-Grouse and then go feather-hunting.  I told Evan my plan, and it was the only thing that calmed him down.

I planned to go alone so Evan could sleep in.  I didn’t expect my dad would be interested, but I was pleasantly surprised when he asked if I wanted company on the trip back to Lavina.  A bonus was that Leo Jurica decided to join us too.  So the three of us set off for the lek we viewed the day before.  We got a later start this time since we didn’t have a blind we were trying to reach in the dark.

Getting there around 7:00 AM, there were still around 20 or so Greater Sage-Grouse males strutting on the lek.  The views were considerably more distant this day since we were on the road. The Sage-Grouse are scattered across the middle of the photo, all the way from the left side to the right side.  There are cattle in the background on the right.

Greater Sage Grouse lek

Though I wasn’t close enough for audio or the best video quality, I was able to document the very unique courtship display.  This first video is an up-close look at two males doing their thing.  Junior high boys or those that still think like them should not watch.

 

 The next video shows a larger group of male Greater Sage-Grouse doing their strut.

    

Around 8:00, the birds started to disperse off the lek for the cover of sagebrush.  Once they were gone, we went to work looking for a replacement feather for Evan.  Apparently there were a couple of stragglers that popped out of the sagebrush on the periphery of the lek. I seized upon an unplanned photo opportunity that screamed out at me.

Dad Sage-Grouse Seeing Sage-Grouse was unforgettable.  Seeing them with Dad was even better.  Now I had a photo of both together which I hadn’t planned but now cherish.  Serendipity.

Dad Sage-GrouseBack to the feather search, we looked and looked and looked.  I foolishly thought the previous evening that this would be an easy task.  Dad, Leo, and I combed the entire lek looking hard for one of those feathers.  We were all dads and 2/3 of us were granddads, so we all searched with due diligence as we all understood how such a matter could make or break a kid’s day and trip.  We went to ground-zero on the lek which is determined by the greatest concentration of bird droppings.  We would find the occasional feather, but they were never the right feathers nor interesting ones for that matter either.  Now finding a feather became something of a treasure hunt where the rarity of the feather enhanced its desirability.  Despite our desire, we could not turn one up.  We finally called it quits for searching at this lek.

There was only one other option–to return to the lek on Emory Road where John found the original feather. There were no birds left on that lek by the time we got there.  That was good because then we could start searching right away.  This lek was smaller, and its ground-zero was even more concentrated with droppings.  Again, there were oddball feathers, even a clump of feathers with skin attached from a Sage-Grouse brawl, but not the right feather.  After a long time of searching but coming up empty, I was feeling really frustrated.  How could it be so hard to find one of these feathers?   I was just about to give up and was thinking I’d write to John to see if he could get me another, when I spied the object I sought, sticking straight up in the air with the quill stuck in a mud crack!  I couldn’t believe it–this was as big a thrill as any rare bird I’ve found.

Sage-Grouse feather

With the coveted feather in hand, we headed back to Billings.  The Sage-Grouse saga truly was over now and was most fulfilling.  As we pulled into the Juricas’ driveway, Evan was outside and ran up to the vehicle immediately asking, “Did you get it?!”  Though it was something I already knew, the question revealed to Dad and Leo just how much this mattered to Evan.  As dads we sometimes go the extra mile to make our kids’ wishes come true and make them happy….Thanks for the trip, Dad, and all the memories Evan and I will carry with us forever.

Josh Dad EvanThe story of our Montana Greater Sage-Grouse Lifer with Rick Wallestad is made up of four parts: 1) The Prologue–The Impetus, 2) Part 1, 3) Part 2, and 4) The Epilogue–Bonus Lifers.