Mike in the Wild

It's been well over a month since I last visited my cabin in Prescott.  After a fifteenth consecutive year of bidding adieu in the early autumn, I knew I would miss the birds that inhabit the pine and oak trees that surround my forest retreat.  No more bridled bushtits and juniper titmice until at least the spring.  However shortly after I returned to Phoenix full-time, a quite familiar Prescott bird, a ladder-backed woodpecker, started paying regular visits to my desert hummingbird feeder for the very first time. This woodpecker is common in my neighborhood and the wide expanse of desert that encompasses Phoenix.  But the black and white creature is also quite common in Prescott where the elevation is over a mile high, creating a much colder and wetter climate: a welcome reprieve to the desert's unrelenting summer heat.  Interestingly, the ladder-backed seems to be the one and only woodpecker species that calls both environments a year-round home.  The fli...

Every competitor wants to soar with eagles, reaching the pinnacle of success in their pursuits.  It's why our televisions are tuned to bake-offs and sports competitions; we want to see the very best cooks and athletes.  And it was this trophy bird, the bald eagle, that was my target when I headed over to Indian Bend Wash in Scottsdale.   The wash is actually a greenbelt of parks, golf courses, bike paths and lakes that comprises eleven miles of a flood diversion channel.  A couple of years ago a pair of bald eagles nested in the area and promoted birdwatching to the list of activities available in the development.  But it seems the eagles have moved on to a less crowded habitat as I can't find a record of their sighting this last year.  And I didn't spot them myself in the little corner of the park I visited yesterday.  However near Indian Bend Road, close to the Silverado Golf Club and the Arizona Canal, three different species of flycatchers...

Except for their varying sizes and wide range of colors, all tyrant flycatchers seem quite similar in appearance and behavior to me.   At least this is the case with the specific members of this largest of bird families that I encounter near my home in the American Southwest.  However, the vast majority of these New World species can be found in their diverse habitats throughout Latin America. In Arizona I can usually start to identify a flycatcher when I see a small bird perched upright on a pole or branch.  Of course many birds sit still from a safe vantage point like a street lamp, but it's only the flycatcher that I notice leaping and fluttering from that position in a unique acrobatic hunting display.  Nine times out of ten he returns to that exact same safe place to try his luck at another chance for more insects. Just last week on a short walk in my Phoenix neighborhood I encountered three flycatchers, all similarly hunting for bugs.  I believe e...

While photographing birds is a fun hobby, identifying and categorizing them is a science.  I wish I had paid more attention to the classification of animal life during my mandatory junior high school biology courses.  My interest in birding, and specifically in the flycatcher family, has given me a deep dive into avian taxonomy. When you start paying attention to birds and their names, you run into new and unfamiliar words like passerines and empids .  I  noticed quickly that these words were being associated with a number of birds that were called flycatchers.  Growing up in the northeast, I was familiar with blue jays, chickadees and robins but not at all with this new species.  When I embraced this new pastime here in Arizona, one of the first birds I shot was a male vermilion flycatcher.   Scarlet like the very familiar cardinal, he's one of prettiest and brightest birds in our desert.  It turns out that he's not only a flycatcher, but he's...

Wildflowers, plants and life are blooming in the Sonoran Desert It may be Winter on the calendar, but it's clearly Spring in the desert.  A good amount of seasonal rain has helped create a bounty of blooms in the area.  And if you don't notice the abundant wildflowers, you should at least see the landscape beyond the city streets and highways has greened considerably. Any short walk into a mountain park or preserve will also remind you that wildlife, notably birds, are thriving amidst this lush flora. Hedgehog cactus flower Brittlebush Cactus bloom. Tiny cacti that cluster in the shade. Bee in blue phacelia, also known as scorpionweed. Blue phacelia or scorpionweed in light. Phoenix Mountain Park is lush with this wildflower. Blue phacelia or scorpionweed in light with cactus. Desert marigold. Both blue and white phacelia. From a distant the mountainsides look green, but in a close-up they are blue. Black-throated spa...