Back to one of my very favorite parts of the country, the Eastern Sierra Mountains. We still haven't made it to the world-famous Yosemite. There are so many alternatives. The goal of this birding trip was to find lots of woodpeckers and to add a new bird sighting to our "list". It began with a return visit to little known Billy's Pond. It is a birding hotspot at certain times of the year.
There weren't many birds on this visit but we had a nice surprise when a Swainson's Hawk flew overhead. (Sorry, no photo of the hawk) We did see plenty of unpopular Bullfrogs and ...
...lots of sparkling dragonflies.
Behind the museum in Independence, a statuesque Great Blue Heron perched on a tall piece of historic farm equipment early one morning.
We returned to the waterfall at Mt. Whitney's portal hoping for the American Dipper that we found last year. If you remember, they nest behind waterfalls. The view was gorgeous but no dipper.
Next stop, Twin Lakes in Mammoth. Wow! What a beautiful spot to camp! We were looking for a reported Red Crossbill. We enjoyed the hike despite missing the bird.
Before heading up to Mono Lake, we stopped at a rest stop with our short bird list. When I got out of the car, I noticed 3 frozen people looking through binoculars. Yeah! This was a good sign! Strangers become friends instantly in the birding world. If you want to make some new friends and explore this beautiful world with others, join your local Audubon birding club. Back to the birders, they pointed out a variety of birds that were drinking water from this bird bath. This turned out to be an unexpected hotspot!
The beautiful White-headed Woodpecker, male and female Western Tanagers and Cassin's Finches took turns drinking water.
Guess who these 2 birds are? Check out the beak. This is the bird we were chasing down unsuccessfully earlier in the day. Yep, they are Red Crossbills! Yahoo!!! This was our first sighting which means a new bird for the "list". Our new birding buddies shared a tip for a rare bird that had recently been sighted and off we went down the road again.
Remember, we were looking for woodpeckers, too. So off we went to a postburn forest that are attractive to woodpeckers. We found a nesting pair of Black-backed Woodpeckers as well as a few pairs of Lewis's Woodpeckers.
Aspen trees attracted these Red-breasted Sapsuckers.
On our final day of birding, we found this beautiful Mountain Bluebird. It was really hard to leave him and....
..the inspiring views.
We decided to follow the tip to find the rare bird sighting. The ebird report informed us that we needed to drive down this gravel road through the woods for miles and miles. I was pretty skeptical we would find it.
Luck was on our side! We found this male Grace's Warbler.
This was the end of our 4-day birding journey. Time to drive home.
Whether you find a new or rare bird, it's fun getting out and trying!
Click on photos to enlarge.
Photos and content by Robin Roberts.
