Arizona: Owls and Warblers

Day 1: Our trip officially begins with a meeting at 6:00 pm where we will meet in the lobby of our Tucson, Arizona hotel for dinner and an introductory meeting. Night in Tucson.

This is my second tour with WINGS and it was beyond awesome! I really appreciate the small size of the group and more importantly the expertise of the tour leader. I really liked the night owl tours and breaking up the day sometimes by going out very early, back for a couple hours and out again in the afternoon and/or evening. - Kathy K.

Day 2: We’ll travel northeast of Tucson to the lower San Pedro River and Aravaipa Canyon. Passing through surprisingly lush Sonoran Desert, we’ll search for Harris’s Hawk, Gilded Flicker, Black-tailed Gnatcatcher, Rufous-winged Sparrow, and Pyrrhuloxia, on our way to the shady cottonwood-willow riparian habitat around Dudleyville, summer home to the southernmost reliable Common Black-Hawks in Arizona. At this season riparian corridors are alive with bird activity, including large numbers of Lucy’s Warblers, Yellow-breasted Chats, and Hooded Orioles. We’ll also look for Mississippi Kite, which has an isolated breeding population in this area, and Zone-tailed Hawk. If weather conditions permit, we’ll travel slightly farther north for Gray Vireo, here at the southern limit of its breeding range in Arizona and the sprightly and attractive Black-chinned Sparrow. We’re also likely to see riparian-favoring species such as Brown-crested and Ash-throated Flycatchers and Bell’s Vireo. In the afternoon we’ll return to Tucson, have an early dinner, and watch the sunset from the lovely desert landscapes of the Santa Catalina Mountains. In the waning moments of daylight we’ll scan for Lesser Nighthawks and listen for Elf Owls as they begin calling from the tall saguaros; it’s the quintessential Sonoran Desert experience. Depending on the weather (and our energy level), we may drive farther up the Mount Lemmon Highway for our first attempts to hear and hopefully see Whiskered Screech-Owls, Flammulated Owl, and perhaps Northern Saw-whet Owl, which are occasional breeders in the highest parts of the mountain. Night in Tucson.

Day 3: We’ll return to Mount Lemmon, where we should be greeted by a cacophony of birdsong emanating from the lower oak-dominated canyons; the voices may include Acorn Woodpecker, Greater Pewee, Olive Warbler, Painted Redstart, and Black-headed Grosbeak. A bit higher on the mountain we’ll enter pine forest, where we’ll search for Western Bluebird, Pygmy Nuthatch, Buff-breasted Flycatcher, and possibly a migrant Townsend’s or Hermit Warbler. Higher still, we’ll arrive at a green canyon dominated by firs and maples where Red-faced Warbler is almost common. This is also a good area for such higher-elevation species as Cordilleran Flycatcher, Mountain Chickadee, Red-breasted Nuthatch, Brown Creeper and Steller’s Jay. After lunch we’ll travel to Madera Canyon, where the pine-oak forests and arrays of feeders should be filled with birds. We’ll take our time birding the lower and middle canyon, searching for Arizona Woodpecker, migrant flycatchers and warblers, and a host of glittering hummingbirds, including Rivoli’s and Broad-billed. Night in Green Valley or Madera Canyon.

Day 4: We’ll explore the remote border ranges of the Atascosa Highlands. We’ll stop in at Pena Blanca Lake, looking for nesting Canyon Wrens, Vermilion Flycatchers, and perhaps a surprise migrant or two tucked into the willows that line this picturesque lake before driving west into the Atascosa wilderness, not far from the Mexican border. A single dirt road skirts the south side of the Atascosa Highlands, passing several south-draining canyons that are the best place in North America to observe certain “Mexican” species. We may encounter Montezuma Quail along the drive, as well as the Southwest form of Eastern Bluebird, a candidate for species status, but our main focus will be California Gulch, a small steep-sided valley that empties into Mexico and is covered in short thornscrub. Here we’ll spend a few hours wandering along a dirt road, seeking border species like Black-capped Gnatcatcher, Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet, Varied Bunting, and the star of the show—Five-striped Sparrow, one of the most range-restricted bird species in the US. After a picnic lunch we’ll finish the loop around Ruby Road, stopping at Arivaca Lake and the Amado Sewage Ponds to check for wayward waterbirds. In the late afternoon we’ll visit the agricultural fields and ponds east of Rio Rico, where we should have excellent comparison views of Western, Cassin’s, and Tropical Kingbirds and perhaps will see comical Black-bellied Whistling-Ducks or glimmering White-faced Ibis feeding in the shallow ponds. If Buff-collared Nightjars are active we will make a late afternoon trip out to the California Gulch area to look for this scarce borderlands breeder. Night in Green Valley or Madera Canyon.

Day 5: We’ll begin the day with roadside birding around Patagonia and along Sonoita Creek, searching for Gray Hawk, Thick-billed Kingbird, Bridled Titmouse, and with luck an assortment of migrants. We’ll stop at the now-famous hummingbird feeders in Patagonia, where we’re likely to see a variety of species including Violet-crowned Hummingbird and large numbers of Broad-billed and Black-chinned. We’ll almost certainly visit Lake Patagonia too, a backup location for Black-capped Gnatcatcher. After lunch in a local café in Patagonia we’ll continue east, stopping in the Sonoita Grasslands to look for Scaled Quail, Grasshopper Sparrow, the Lillian’s form of Eastern Meadowlark, and Chihuahuan Raven. We’ll reach Sierra Vista and the delightful Huachuca Mountains in mid-afternoon. After a brief break at our hotel we’ll begin our investigation of the canyons on the eastern flank of the Huachucas, possibly including Ramsey and Ash Canyons, where feeders sometimes support Lucifer Hummingbird among the more common species. Night in Sierra Vista. 

Day 6: We’ll begin in Miller Canyon, which supports a diverse avifauna, including Grace’s Warbler and Spotted Owl, and a famous set of hummingbird feeders where up to seven species are regular in early May, often including the scarce White-eared Hummingbird. A hike up the Miller Canyon trail should reveal Red-faced Warblers, Painted Redstarts, and Arizona Woodpeckers, as well as a good number of migrant birds. Our chief prize, though, will be a chance to see Mexican Spotted Owls on a day roost, often quite close to the trail. We often hear or see Northern Pygmy-Owl on the hike, as well as an interesting assortment of mid-elevation reptiles and butterflies. Once we’re done with the hike we’ll watch the feeders for a bit before driving to the quirky mining town of Bisbee, where we’ll have lunch at a small café. 

In the afternoon we’ll drive to Portal, with stops at Whitewater Draw and Willcox Twin Lakes, where we hope to encounter a broad array of migrating shorebirds and waterbirds. Birds such as Wilson’s Phalarope, Eared Grebe, and American Avocet (all in full breeding plumage) should be common. Around the lakes we may encounter Bendire’s Thrasher or Scaled Quail, and every visit to Willcox during migration seems to produce a surprise or two. We’ll arrive in Cave Creek Canyon in time for dinner, followed by a short evening owling excursion to look for Western Screech and Elf Owls and perhaps Common Poorwill or Mexican Whip-poor-will. **Night in Portal.

Days 7 and 8: Our two full days in the Chiricahuas is always special. A wide array of habitat types converge near Portal, including the sycamore-lined creek bed of South Fork, mid-elevation pine forests along Turkey Creek, juniper woodland near Paradise, and open Chihuahuan Desert around Rodeo NM. One early morning (pre-breakfast) outing to Rodeo should reveal skulky Crissal and Bendire’s Thrashers and perhaps singing Botteri’s Sparrows or migrating Lazuli Buntings. During our time here we’ll spend a morning walking along South Fork, where bird diversity can be staggering. Some of the specialties here include Blue-throated Mountain-gem, Elegant Trogon, and Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher, but the sheer beauty of the location can overshadow even such an exotic trio. We’ll have a some mid-afternoon rest time on each day. We will also plan to head uphill, looking for Mexican Chickadees near Turkey Creek. As the sun sets and nightbirds begin to take over, we’ll seek out Flammulated Owls among the higher-elevation pines. **Nights in Portal.

Day 9: This morning we’ll take an early-morning trip to the tiny town of Paradise, where we should be able to find Juniper Titmouse, Woodhouse’s Scrub-Jay, and perhaps Black-chinned Sparrow in the juniper forest. We’ll spend the rest of the morning near Paradise, and early afternoon driving up and over Onion Saddle, seeking out Mexican Chickadee and any other high-elevation species of interest. After a picnic lunch we’ll stop again at the ponds at Willcox, where a good variety of lingering ducks and migrant shorebirds can be expected. We’ll arrive at our hotel at a reasonable hour and then enjoy a leisurely farewell dinner at an excellent Mexican restaurant. Night in Tucson.

Day 10: The trip concludes this morning in Tucson.

2024 Narrative

In Brief

Spring in Arizona is always a bird-rich time of year to visit the remote chain of mountains known as the Sky Islands along the Mexican border. While there are several species of birds that will delay breeding until the late summer monsoon period (also known as Second Spring), there are plenty of species that arrive in late April/early May with the intentions of selecting territories and mates and initiating a breeding cycle. Part of the richness of the bird life is in no small part due to the diversity of habitats that we visited. Over the course of the week, we tallied in 183 species of birds featuring species of six owls and eleven species of warblers. There were numerous highlights including Montezuma Quail, Lucifer, White-eared and Berylline Hummingbirds, Snowy Plovers, Northern Pygmy Owl, Crested Caracara, Thick-billed Kingbird, Gray Vireo, Mexican Chickadee, Bendire’s and Crissal Thrashers, Rose-breasted Grosbeak and Five-striped Sparrow.

In Detail

For our first day of the tour, we traveled north of Tucson towards main destination, Aravaipa Canyon, with its verdant cottonwood and sycamore lined stream that flows year round as it cuts through a Sonoran Desert landscape of saguaro, prickly pear, and cholla cactus. We soon began to get acquainted with the breeding birds of this habitat dichotomy, with White-winged Doves, Gila Woodpeckers, both Ash-throated and Brown-crested Flycatchers as well as colorful Vermilion Flycatchers, Bell’s Vireos, Verdins, Hooded Orioles, Summer Tanagers and Lucy’s Warblers abounding. We had especially close looks at the Sonoran Desert nesting subspecies of Purple Martin when a pair perched close by just below our eye level on top of a saguaro cactus growing down a hillside. A robust Western Diamond-backed Rattlesnake was our only snake of the tour, but showed well as it crossed the road in front of us. A few north-bound migrants showed themselves here, including two Olive-sided Flycatchers and the first of many Western Tanagers.

On the way to Aravaipa we did well for raptors, spotting a Harris’s Hawk at our first rest stop and later seeing our first Gray Hawk and a late migrant Swainson’s Hawk, as well as Cooper’s and Red-tailed Hawks. On the drive back to Tucson we stopped to enjoy daytime looks at Burrowing and Barn Owls.

Our second day was devoted to Mount Lemmon in the Santa Catalina Mountains northeast of Tucson. Beginning in spectacular Sonoran Desert dominated by stately saguaro cacti where we encountered our first Pyrrhuloxias and Black-throated Sparrows, we ascended all the way up to Ponderosa Pine and Douglas-fir forests at over 8000 feet where Grace’s and Red-faced Warblers and Yellow-eyed Juncos added a Sierra Madrean flair to high elevation Rocky Mountain species such as Hairy Woodpecker, Plumbeous Vireo and Red-breasted Nuthatch, along with the southernmost Arizona population of Mountain Chickadee.  Along the way we tracked down a locally rare Gray Vireo and spotted a relentlessly tooting Northern Pygmy Owl. Having dipped on Common Black-Hawk at Aravaipa, we were delighted to have a pair fly over us in Rose Canyon. It took a little scrounging but towards the end of the morning we were able to locate our only Virgania’s Warbler for the tour.

We then spent two nights at the famed Santa Rita Lodge, giving us easy nighttime access to forests of oak and alligator bark juniper where we heard Mexican Whip-poor-wills and Whiskered Screech-Owls and got great views of a diminutive Elf Owl bringing food to its nest. The feeders here gave great views of Bridled Titmouse, Mexican Jay, Acorn Woodpecker, Rivoli’s Hummingbird, Bronzed Cowbird, Hepatic Tanager, and several flyover looks at a Zone-tailed Hawk. An exploration of Box Canyon gave us looks at Hutton’s Vireo, Hooded Oriole, Arizona Woodpecker and Golden Eagle and an afternoon stop at a park in Green Valley afforded us a nice visit with a dazzling male Costa’s Hummingbird.

But that was just a warmup for the hummingbird spectacles to come in the next few days. On our way to our overnight stay in Sierra Vista, we stopped at the Paton Center for Hummingbirds in Patagonia where we easily obtained great looks at Violet-crowned Hummingbird and a late migrant male Rufous Hummingbird. Also here we viewed a pair of Thick-billed Kingbirds and had the only Lazuli Bunting of the tour. And this was after visiting scenic Montosa Canyon where a vocal Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet showed itself well and a Five-striped Sparrow that had teased us with songs for several minutes eventually gave great views.

We capped off that day’s birding at the Ash Canyon Bird Sanctuary, where we enjoyed seeing Bullock’s and Scott’s Orioles, numerous Lark Sparrows and Black-headed Grosbeaks, and several Anna’s, Black-chinned, Broad-billed and Broad-tailed Hummingbirds. Our persistence paid off with eventual repeated views of a female Montezuma Quail and a male Lucifer Hummingbird!

The next morning began with a short drive from our Sierra Vista hotel to the Nature Conservancy’s world-renowned Ramsey Canyon Preserve, where we were greeted by a Berylline Hummingbird building its nest in a sycamore tree near the visitor center entrance. A hike on the Preserve’s trail resulted in great looks at Painted Redstart, Black-throated Gray and Townsend’s Warblers, a newly arrived Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher and an unexpected migrant Buff-breasted Flycatcher. The high point of the morning however was certainly the vocal male Elegant Trogon that accompanied us down the trail, giving all great looks.

Our next stop was at the San Pedro House where the Western Screech-Owl that is sometimes seen roosting in a giant Fremont cottonwood during the day was not showing itself when we arrived, so we contented ourselves with looks at colorful Summer Tanagers, Northern Cardinals and Lesser Goldfinches and took the opportunity to study the differences between Abert’s and Canyon Towhees. A second check of the Western Screech-Owl’s roost site before we left revealed that the owl had emerged into view, so all got good looks at this well-camouflaged gray-plumaged denizen of low elevation woodlands.

Our last stop on our drive to Portal in the famed Chiricahua Mountains was an hour and a half visit to Willcox for a waterbird fix. Among the half dozen duck species here were Cinnamon Teal and Mexican Ducks, formerly regarded as a subspecies of the Mallard. Dark glossy-plumaged White-faced Ibises walked around amongst boldly patterned Black-necked Stilts and American Avocets. We searched out colorful Red-necked Phalaropes swimming and spinning around among the more numerous Wilson’s Phalaropes. Some Green-tailed Towhees that had not yet left for their more northerly breeding grounds were a surprise on the lawn of the adjacent golf course.

For the last two nights of the tour we stayed at the Cave Creek Ranch in the tiny hamlet of Portal in the foothills of the Chiricahua Mountains. Set in the sycamore-lined South Fork of Cave Creek Canyon, a location rich in ornithological history, bird life abounds here, with the largest North American hummingbird species, the Blue-throated Mountain-Gem being a common resident and prime attraction.

Many of the people making their home in Portal are birders, and some have opened up their yards for the public to view their bird-feeding stations. We spent time at a few of these, and got great looks at such species as Greater Roadrunner, Ladder-backed Woodpecker, Woodhouse’s Scrub-Jay, Hooded, Scott’s and Bullock’s Orioles, Gambel’s Quail, Bushtit, Cactus Wren, Curve-billed Thrasher, Black-throated Sparrow, Blue Grosbeak and many more.

No springtime trip to the Chiricahuas would be complete without a trip to the conifer-dominated forests at the higher elevations and we spent the better part of our first day here exploring this region. Between Onion Saddle and Rustler Park we encountered such high elevation specialties as Pygmy Nuthatch, Yellow-eyed Junco, Western Bluebird, Hermit Thrush, Grace’s and Red-faced Warblers, Steller’s Jay, Hairy Woodpecker and Red Crossbill. We also found the much sought after range-restricted Mexican Chickadee, which occurs at no other accessible location north of Mexico.

We also ventured a few miles down the west side of the mountain where we saw Greater Pewee, Western Wood-Pewee, Western Flycatcher (of the breeding subspecies formerly given species status as Cordilleran Flycatcher), and Buff-breasted Flycatcher. After returning to the ranch, we took an evening drive and heard Mexican Whip-poor-wills at close range, but could not manage to see one, but did get great looks at both Western and Whiskered Screech-Owls.

On our last morning in the Chiricahuas, we traveled to the nearby town of Paradise for a delicious catered breakfast at the George Walker House, stopping along the way to pick up Juniper Titmouse and Rufous-crowned Sparrow for the trip. Highlights of our visit here, along with more Juniper Titmice, Rivoli’s Hummingbirds, and Inca Doves, included our first sightings of Band-tailed Pigeon, a regional rarity in the form of a Rose-breasted Grosbeak, and we had the good fortune of spotting Arizona’s first White-eared Hummingbird of the spring!

On our drive back to Tucson we again stopped at Willcox, where we discovered a pair of locally rare Snowy Plovers, two Bonaparte’s Gulls and a seasonally rare Stilt Sandpiper wearing its sharp breeding plumage, as well as local specialties such as Scaled Quail, Chihuahuan Raven and Chihuahuan Meadowlark (formerly considered a subspecies of Eastern Meadowlark). Elsewhere in the Willcox area we had good scope looks at both Bendire’s and Crissal Thrashers, giving us quite a diverse list for the last day of a tour with a great overall diversity of habitats and birds.

- Skye Haas

Back to Narratives