It was frosty this morning, and I left
the motel in Green Valley early to get to Madera Canyon. Madera is one of the “hotspots” of birding in
the U.S., with the creek flowing northwesterly out of the southwest slopes of
the Santa Rita range. The riparian
woodlands border the intermittent stream, with the bordering uplands being
vegetated by mesquite, juniper-oak woodlands, and pine forests.
A White-throated Thrush Turdus assimillis had been reported feeding
with a flock of Robins a quarter mile along the trail above the Proctor Road
parking lot.
I walked the lower loop a couple of
times, but neither I nor the other birders were seeing this rarity this
morning. Neither could I find the
Whiskered Screech Owl that had been seen along here for the past several
days. There were lots of robins feeding
in the hackberry bushes.
And a cottontail rabbit gave me the
eye. I presume that this is the local pale
subspecies of the Eastern Cottontail, rather than the Desert Cottontail which
is supposed to have ears nearly as long as a jackrabbit’s.
After a while, I decided to hike
upstream to the Santa Rita Lodge, which is south across the County Line in Santa
Cruz County. This ‘intermittent’ creek
had a lot of water in it from recent rains and melting snow.
The canyon has a reputation for being one of the best places to bird in the country, and I did see a number of birds as I went up the trail.
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| Mexican Jay |
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| Red-naped Sapsucker |
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| Turkey Gobbler |
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| Arizona Gray Squirrel - Sciurus arizonensis |
I made it to the Lodge, where they have
a large area set up for feeding the birds, as well as a covered gallery for the
bird watchers.
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| There were nearly three dozen people watching the feeders here |
The star of today’s show at the Lodge
was this nice male Blue-throated Hummingbird.
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| A nice male hummer! |
And, there were lots of other birds to
watch including the horde of Wild Turkeys that followed one of the staff to the
feeders
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| Female Arizona Woodpecker checking out a knot hole |
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| Male Hepatic Tanager |
Having grown up in Oregon’s Willamette
Valley, I always enjoy seeing Acorn Woodpeckers.
They do have a tendency to perforate
the power poles, seeing these as a great place to store their food supply.
After about an hour, it was beginning
to rain, then it was rain mixed with snow.
I walked on back down the canyon toward the Proctor Road parking lot,
checking out a Pyracantha bush near the Bog Springs picnic area that had been
having an Elegant Trogon coming to feed.
There were lots of Robins and Hermit Thrush coming to this firethorn,
but alas, no Trogon.
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| Hermit Thrush |
I did check out a couple of historical
spots. One was a ‘bedrock mortar’, which
local Native Americans used as a grinding stone to prepare foodstuffs.
The other was the “White House”.
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| Photo stolen from "Friends of Madera Canyon" |
All that now remains of the place is part of one
adobe wall.
There was a cold, steady rain coming down as I got
to the place where the Thrush had been seen.
A group of birders said they’d seen the bird bathing in a pool in the
creek, so I sat and waited until I began shivering, then determined to give up
the search for the day. |
| Adobe melts in the rain . . . |
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| Brown bird in the rain . . . |
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| White-throated Thrush - a Life Bird! |
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| Time, patience, and perseverance accomplisheth all things . . . |
The cold rain was really coming down now,
so I drove out of the canyon and south on the Interstate to the community of
Tubac, to get out of the rain, and where a pair of Rose-throated Becards had
been seen in recent days. This would
also have been a “Life” bird, and was worth the effort. I ran into two other groups of birders along
the De Anza trail, which follows along the Santa Cruz River, but they hadn’t seen
or heard the bird. Juan Bautista de
Anza, Captain of the Tubac Presidio, left Culiacan, Sinaloa, Mexico in the
summer of 1775 on a journey to the Presidio in San Francisco, California. The National Historic Trail was authorized by
Congress on August 15, 1990, and follows as closely as possible the historic
route taken by Anza and the 300 immigrants in his charge during the winter of
1775-76. Plans are under way to include
the 600 miles of the route that lie within Mexico to make it the first
International Historic Trail in the world.
In many places, the trail is only a line on the map, but sections of
walking trail do exist in both Arizona and California. The route here in Tubac
is solely for hiking and equestrian travelers.
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| Santa Cruz River |
It was a nice walk, but I’d arrived at
4:30 p.m., and it was getting dark, so I returned to the motel in Green Valley
to rest up and give it another try tomorrow.
Proctor Road morning eBird Checklist is
Here
Lower Madera Canyon morning eBird
Checklist is Here
Madera Picnic Area eBird Checklist is
Here
Santa Rita Lodge eBird Checklist is Here
Lower Madera Canyon afternoon eBird
Checklist is Here
De Anza Trail eBird Checklist is Here
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