Category: Trip Reports (Page 2 of 26)

Yellow-headed Caracara in Popeye’s Parking Lot

Strange times are these in which we live

Popeye’s Dumpster + Halal Meat Market = Yellow-headed Caracara in Los Angeles

All rarities are not equal. Sometimes, a bird is found in a place so improbable that the biggest mystery is what in the wide world of sports the bird is doing there. The Snowy Owl we had in Los Angeles in December 2022 was one such bird. The wandering Steller’s Sea Eagle that has traveled since 2020 from Alaska to Texas and then to Newfoundland is another.

How these vagrants ended up out of place matters in a bunch of ways. If it escaped captivity as a pet, or as a falconry bird, or if it was sprung from a zoo like Flaco the Eurasian Eagle-Owl in New York City (may he rest in peace), it’s a fun curiosity. Same for those birds who (probably) hitched a ride on a cargo ship across the ocean. If it’s part of a group that was intentionally released (European Starling in the U.S.) or escaped captivity (parrots on Southern California), it might lead to a sustaining population. If it is naturally occurring–that is, if it flew on its own–it creates questions for science. Was it moved by a big storm? Is it out of range because of food stress, or habitat loss, or climate change? Is it a species that is thriving and expanding its range?

My first, distant, fuzzy look of an out-of-place raptor

We had one of those improbable birds in Los Angeles in April when a Yellow-headed Caracara was found dumpster diving behind a Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen. Yellow-headed Caracara are a South American raptor that is a regular as far north as Costa Rica. That’s a long, long way from Hollywood. And yet, a Yellow-Headed Caracara spent a winter in Humboldt County, California in 2007-08. Another has been around Miami, Florida for two years (and is still there). Did this L.A. bird fly here on its own? Did it hitch a ride on a tanker going through the Panama Canal and disembark at nearby Long Beach harbor? The answer is almost certainly unknowable. That’s a bummer for those obsessed with their official list. Like the Snowy Owl, it probably won’t be considered “countable”, at least for now. But my list is my list, and it doesn’t play by the birding police rules. As I’ve said before, if a bird can survive for more than a week, however it got there, its counts on my list. 

So it was with a mixture of wonder and joy that I headed out to see the caracara. When I showed up at the Popeye’s parking lot, there were a half dozen birders, but no caracara. It had apparently been there before I arrived, and flew off to the west. So I went walking the neighborhood to the west (between sitting and wandering, I’m a wanderer). After a half hour, I found the Yellow-Headed Caracara. First, I saw a raptor fly in from the northwest and dip down behind a house. I walked down the street a bit hoping for a view, and found the caracara perched on a utility pole. Some crows were harassing it, and it flew to the cover of a big tree. I alerted the birders via WhatsApp, and a couple of folks scurried over to see it. The views at this point weren’t good. But the bird was calling occasionally, a loud screech. After 20 minutes or so without the bird moving, I left. It eventually made it back to Popeye’s, waiting for dumpster eats and looking for hand-outs. Two weeks later, it is still there.

It’s a wonder that more birds don’t hang around dumpsters and fast food parking lots. They’ve got to be reliable sources of food, and for scavengers like caracara or vultures, they’d seem to be prime targets. Apparently, the L.A. caracara had been around for at least 3 weeks before the birding world discovered it. Curious to see how long it remains.

 

 

 

 

New Year, New LA County Lifers

A Winter Wren in the right season, but on the wrong coast

Two New LA County Lifers in the New Year

The New Year is an exciting time for birders because their precious year lists revert to zero. Every species, including the commonest of resident birds, is a new tick again. On top of that, it’s the season of Christmas Bird Counts – the annual ritual of counting all the birds in a designated 15-mile diameter circle. In addition to yearly snapshots of bird populations, Christmas Bird Counts have a tendency to produce good rarities. With so many birders covering not just the frequent haunts but places that folks don’t often check, all kinds of surprises turn up.

As the calendar turned to 2024, a couple of birds were in LA County that I’d never seen here before. One was a Hepatic Tanager. These birds range from the southwestern U.S. down to South America, but rarely make it to the west coast. This one had been found on November 20th in Griffith Park. It was found near a gold course by an out-of-town birder who didn’t ID and report the finding until 9 days later.  It was refound in the same area the next day and a couple of days later. And then reports quit. A few days before Christmas, Andy Birch found it again. It was still in the same area. I made one stop on January 4 during a lunch break, but couldn’t find it. A couple of days later I went in the morning and was lucky enough to spot it. While I’d seen one before in SE Arizona and Mexico, it was a lifer for several birders around me. 

The other good bird in the county was a Winter Wren. It’s part of a duo of tiny brown, short-tailed wrens with a dazzlingly long song that used to be just one species. But in 2010, the Winter Wren and Pacific Wren were split. West of the Rocky Mountains is the Pacific Wren. East of the Rocky Mountains is the Winter Wren. I’ve seen each before – the Pacific Wren a couple times in LA County and once up in Seattle. The Winter Wren is a resident in Maine that I see each summer when we visit. But I’d never seen a Winter Wren in LA County before. In fact, this was only the second county record for Winter Wren.

The Winter Wren was found on December 31st at Castaic Lagoon (which, I guess, technically, is a lagoon). I went up there the next day, the morning of January 1st, to see if I could find it. As I arrived at the spot at 7:30am, a couple of workers were 50 yards away running a chain saw. Despite this inauspicious start, I spotted a juvenile Bald Eagle soaring overhead. And then I quickly found the Winter Wren. After about 5 minutes, the chain-saw stopped. Ten seconds later, the Winter Wren popped up in the bushes in front of me and starting calling. It didn’t seem bothered by my close presence, and called away for 5 minutes before disappearing into the brush. I then walked the shore of the lagoon and spotted the Red-necked Grebe that’s been around. I was far from my 5MR, but it was a nice way to start the year.

Later on January 1st, LA-birding guru Kimball Garrett sent out a new year message on the LA County birding listserv, As he has done previously, he urged birders to take a break from county year-listing. Instead, he encouraged focus on a “birds found” list. That is, rather than chasing birds found by others, he hoped birders would prioritize finding birds themselves. The next day, I decided to chime in. As the original champion of 5MR birding in L.A., I felt this was a good chance to shout-out again for birders to focus on birding near home. As i said in my message, it’s a win for science, a win for the Earth, and a win for other birders because of the birds I find that otherwise would go undetected.

Unable to resist the temptation to take a shot at the perpetual county big-year listers, I called that approach to birding “gross.” Which it is. This meant I was openly criticizing a dozen or so of LA County’s long-time and well-known birders (and year-after-year-after-year eBird Top 100 list toppers). Maybe I went too far, or chose my words poorly. But I don’t regret it. As I said to the birder who complained about my characterization, there are downsides to year-list-driven long-distance car birding that we must acknowledge.

« Older posts Newer posts »