On Saturday, Non-Birding Vida and I went to Yellowstone to see if we could find some wolves. Vida had never seen a wolf, so I had a mission in life. We entered the park at 7 AM, and we proceeded toward the Lamar Valley. Upon the entering the valley, everything was still and quiet. Just a few bison bulls in the distance and not much else, save for the backside of a lone coyote. We cruised the valley twice without a wolf sighting.

Heading east toward Soda Butte, I spied a form atop a ridge. There he was, the alpha male from the newly named christened Silver Pack.  Loping through the snow, he came off the ridge and across the road. He continued up and over a hill. In the saddle behind the hill, he joined 4 other wolves. A younger member of the pack was outfitted with a radio collar. The alpha stayed apart from his loafing compatriots, he just leaned against a Douglas-fir. It was apparent that he was suffering from mange from the missing fur on his legs. The parasitic mites were driving him to gnaw on his irritated skin.

After some extended wolf viewing and a quick trip to Cooke City for use of the amenities, we headed out the Lamar to the Boiling River for a soak. Passing Floating Island Lake, a bull moose was browsing on a stand of willows. It was quite interesting to watch this huge deer use its maneuverable upper lip to grasp the willow stems. The fact that moose can make it through the winter browsing on such nutritionally deficient plant material is rather amazing to me.

Arriving at Mammoth, we noticed a maintenance truck parked on the side of road and two orange-clad Park employees were glancing up the hill. They pointed out three wolves resting amongst the sagebrush. One black, one gray, and a third was almost white. What a great day to end the wolf-watching days.

The soak at Boiling River was too relaxing, and made magical by the singing American Dippers and Townsend’s Solitaires. The solitaires were busy chasing one another, maybe a sign that spring and its amorous aspects were repeatedly approaching.

Yesterday, I managed to take a quick trip around the valley to enjoy the warm sun and see what the birds were up to these days. While the birding was a bit slow, but the scenery was spectacular. The intensity of the sun was causes an unique low-level fog off the snow. The feeling that I was getting more than anything else was that winter seems to be losing its grip on the land. It’s only a matter of time before the first spring migrants return and scenery transforms from white to green.

The Best Peru Birding YouTube Channels and Videos

• Birds of Peru – Many HD videos of birds of Peru and around the world – GREAT!
• Jan van Bekkum – Video clips of his trip to Peru
• kblomer – 13 videos of a great birding trip to Peru – they went with Gunnar and Kolibri Expeditions
• Birding in the Pantanos de Villa – Great video from a great birding spot
• TVArtZ – Footage from a trip based out of Lima
• Random Original Wildlife Videos – Videos of individual Peruvian species

I cannot wait for my upcoming in June with Kolibri Expeditions and Gunnar Engblom. I will be visiting the Manu lowlands for 8 days, and hope to see a great number of the terrific species that live there. You can join me on this trip or book your own with Gunnar here.

Imagine the surprise of John O’Neill and Gary Graves of Louisiana State University when they mist-netted a strange little owl in the cloud forest of northern Peru in 1976. A strange, small creature with wispy feathers flaring out from its facial disk and peculiar amber eyes. Its legs were bare, and it lacked ear tufts. Bristles covered the base of its bill. The bird was obviously new to science, and it was so unique that it was placed in its own monotypic genus, Xenoglaux (strange owl). It was not seen again until 1978. It call wasn’t even recorded until 2002.

So, a strange little owl had only been observed 3 times, and then only with the assistance of mist nets. Guess what happened on January 24th of this year? An Israeli researcher named Shachar Alterman and Edin Fonseca, a local guide,  actually managed to capture images and video of a Long-whiskered Owlet without the aid of capture. For the first time a wild Long-whiskered Owlet was observed in its habitat. The video done with an illuminated bird and a bit shaky, but it is incredible to view this species.

Just another aspect of the Peru’s amazing natural world that makes my upcoming in June with Kolibri Expeditions and Gunnar Engblom even more exciting and enticing. I will be visiting the Manu lowlands for 8 days, and hope to see a great number of the terrific species that live there. I’m having dreams of Harpy Eagles, the famous macaw lick, and Giant Otters. You can join me on this trip or book your own with Gunnar here.

Once again, there is a claim of a recently captured image of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. This time it comes from the Sabine River Basin of Texas by a fellow named Daniel Rainsong via an obtuse press release. He has, rather strangely, not released the images citing some obscure “right of discovery”. Does he intend to patent the damn bird? On the other hand, he does list some prominent ornithologists in his press release as potential examiners of the images…supposedly. A Google search of Daniel Rainsong yields precious little information. It seems that he as not been active in the birding community to any sufficient degree. In fact, most of the top results are for a gambler (aren’t we all, though) with a system.  Is this a hoax or a self-aggrandizing move by some casino boat lounge lizard become birder?

I want to believe that a great woodpecker stills pounds away at massive trucks in some remote region of the South, but I have to be realistic. Unfortunately, I doubt that the Ivory-billed still exists given the scarcity (read absence)  of definitive proof and the degradation of and patchiness of any remaining habitat. So I beg, please, please Daniel Rainsong prove me wrong.

The day was a rather ordinary day of winter birding. A few Townsend’s Solitaires, a long Northern Shrike, and many Rough-legged Hawks. The star of the day was a Ferruginous Hawk. This is my first winter Ferruginous Hawk in the Gallatin Valley. You can get all the sighting details from the WilderTrack link below. I managed a few shots (not the best by a long shot).

		I hate power lines!

Gunnar Engblom from Kolibri Expeditions is offering a Social Media for Birders workshop via 3-4 blog postings per week. I will be participating in this workshop and I encourage any other birder to join this workshop.

There is an amazing opportunity to win a free birding trip to Peru at http://bit.ly/8s830C…the word about this contest is being spread via social media such as Twitter and Facebook. This effort promotes eco-friendly tourism and a solid conservation message from Gunnar Engblom. I encourage everyone to give this opportunity a look.

Went birding with Sam on Saturday, and we found a few new for us for the Gallatin Valley this winter. Atop Springhill went found a nice feeding flock of Lapland Longspurs. Then, we came across a couple of first-winter Northern Shrike.

There has been a Long-tailed Duck or Oldsquaw (more on that later) at the ponds near Warm Springs. It was first reported on Sunday, and I though it’ll take off before I can drive the 2 hours. Then it was seen again on Monday, and once again, I said to myself, “It’ll fly the coop.” On Tuesday, it was still present, and I pondered, “I’m going!”.

I decided to left Bozeman at 6 in the morning and picked up Andrew Guttenberg for the chase. A storm had blown through the valley during the night and laid down about 3 inches of fresh snow. The roads were the usual slick and dangerous, and we took off slowly. The weather continued to spit snow occasionally as we crossed the Continental Divide and descended to the source of the Clark Fork River and the ponds that held the duck.

As we exited the interstate and turned onto the gravel road that runs along the south side of the pond, an all-white appearing duck was evident on the pond in the milky twilight. Then it dove, so we parked at a higher overlook, and there was the Long-tailed Duck and man, did it put on a show. It made long dive after long dive, and we watched it for about 1 hour. The light was very murky, so the images aren’t the greatest but what the hell.

Oh yeah, the excitement…as we were observing the duck, a loud crushing sound followed by scraping erupted from the slick highway. as we turned a van was sliding down the road, but only it was up side down. The driver was okay and no else was injured or delayed. What’s more exciting, the wreck or the Long-tailed Duck? C’mon…the duck hands down.

Now back to the name. Is it a Long-tailed Duck or an Oldsquaw? I know that it is politically incorrect, but I do prefer the old name. But the AOU changed the name not out of PC concerns, but due to the rest of the world referring to the bird as a Long-tailed Duck. So, I guess it’s a Long-tailed Duck and a Squawfish is now a Northern Pikeminnow…things changed and no use offending Native American folks.