Mike in the Wild

We're lucky to have in the middle of the Phoenix metropolitan sprawl a world-class desert plant museum and education center.  The Desert Botanical Garden's collections of cacti, succulents, trees and plants from all the globe's arid regions are arranged in a multitude of beautiful landscapes, habitats and gardens.  Unsurprisingly, the desert flora attracts a multitude of critters that include many birds, both resident and migratory. But the park of course makes money and needs to attract the people that spend it.  So the garden also has restaurants, shops, art galleries and regular events like the holiday season's Las Noces de las Luminarias when luminaria bags, strings of lights and live bands overtake the peace and calm you might associate with the grounds.  And over at least the last ten years there have been frequent but temporary art installations that have placed contemporary sculptures and lights throughout the desert landscape. As a wildlife and nature lo...

I write quite a bit about the birds I see from my deck in Prescott and from my patio in Phoenix.  In fact, one of the messages I like to spread on "Mike in the Wild" is that the wonder and beauty of nature is right outside our windows, or at least just a short distance off our porches. At my mountain home I entice my feathered subjects with several attractions: three feeders filled individually with seeds, suet and nectar; a ceramic bowl where I replenish freshwater; and small piles of peanuts for the jays.  As a result, last summer from the Fourth of July weekend to the fourth week of August, I identified almost forty individual bird species visiting my forested property.  In contrast, I only maintain a hummingbird feeder at my Phoenix home where I usually see the Anna's and Costa's varieties.  My ten year-old cat has frequent access to my walled-in yard so I don't want to inadvertently set traps for other garden visitors.  Of  shocking concern, house ...

My small Phoenix backyard is in many ways an extension of my home.  Its patio provides extra space to relax with a book or entertain friends with a cocktail.  A gas-flamed grill lets me cook authentic paella and roast Hatch chili peppers when they appear in the local markets late in the summer.  And the garden space guarantees that a cornucopia of succulents and trees will nourish my love of nature and gardening. Further on this latter point, my yard also feeds many of my neighborhood's birds.  And I'm thrilled that it's a place that a pair of northern cardinals continues to regularly visit.  As showy as they are in their size and color, and as vocal as they are with their frequent songs and alerts, it's often the fluttering sound they make when they fly that alerts me to their presence in the area.  Only the flapping wings of a mourning dove taking flight seems noisier. In addition, squawking Gila woodpeckers, trilling white-crowned sparrows and crooni...

Besides the ever-present rock pigeon, house sparrows might be the most common bird that the majority of people see in their everyday lives.  It's impossible to enjoy a lunch al fresco at your favorite restaurant without one of these persistent birds begging for crumbs.  But as widespread as this animal is in North American cities, it's not a native.  In fact it's not even a sparrow as Americans know them. The house sparrow was introduced to the continent first in the nineteenth century, and after several additional introductions spread from as far north as Canada into South America.  It's in a family of birds known generally as Old World sparrows, as opposed to the many more species in an entirely separate family often referred to as New World sparrows.  In this latter group are a wide-ranging variety of birds that include towhees, juncos and many with a last name sparrow but with descriptive first names like green-tailed, rufous-crowned or black-throated....