A Great Moment on the Tuolumne River Parkway Trail: Phainopeplas!

It has been a couple of extraordinary days walking along the Tuolumne River. Two days in a row I saw new species of warbler for the first time, a Nashville Warbler, and a Black-throated Gray Warbler. I went out again this morning and spotted the Gray Warbler again, but as I was watching it I became aware of an odd looking bird in the elderberry thicket a short distance farther along the trail. It was very thin with a long tail, and a closer look in the zoom revealed a crest. It was a Phainopepla (Phainopepla nitens).

I've enjoyed seeing this unusual bird. It's actually a denizen of the tropical deserts and I see them rarely because the Tuolumne River lies close to the northern range of the species (although with global warming the range is expanding northward). I read a note just a day or two ago that birders in Washington state were thrilled to see a single Phainopepla at the north end of the Olympic Peninsula, the first such sighting in 24 years. Only a few have ever been seen even in Oregon (three sightings over the years).

Anyway, with the bird this morning...do you remember the scene in Top Gun where everyone is watching the radar at two bogeys, but then they turn to three, and then six (this was disconcerting to the two fighter pilots sent to intercept them). It was like that this morning. I was snapping one picture after another of the first bird I noticed and then I saw there was another perched just below. Then I looked again and there were two more! Some hikers came over the rise and startled the birds and they took off...all six of them! That's more Phainopeplas than I've seen total in three years of searching along the river.

It was a fine morning.