Great Basin Birds

This last weekend Libby and I went birding in Laguna Niguel Regional Park because we had to take a trip to Dana Point to pick up a box of supplies her class needs for their annual field trip to the Pilgrim with the Ocean Institute. Anyway, Laguna Niguel Regional Park is along the way, and it has one of the few local Tricolored Blackbird flocks in Southern California. I was hoping to get some pictures of the Tricolored Blackbirds, but that didn't work out because the birds were uncooperative and the camera was running out of batteries. Still, we had a pretty good time. There were some migrants moving through - Common Yellowthroats, a Warbling Vireo, Yellow Warblers, Orange-crowned Warblers and Western Tanagers made up the bulk of the flocks. But, we also had a rare bird - a Plumbeous Vireo.

Plumbeous Vireos are the Great Basin counterpart to the Pacific slope's Cassin's Vireos and to the East's Blue-headed Vireos -- a group of birds formerly considered one species. They've begun extending their range into California's mountains fairly recently, and as such, are being found more commonly in migration and winter in coastal Southern California. Still, they're still less common than Cassin's Vireos, and it was exciting to see one. Plus, we had good looks at the bird, and it was very handsome - slate gray with strong wing bars, eye-rings and a spectacles.

This morning on my way to work, I found a Virginia's Warbler. This is a Vermivora warbler that's restricted to the Great Basin like the Plumbeous Vireo, and is very similar to the Nashville Warbler of the East and Pacific Slope. It also has extended its range into California's mountains recently, and is found in small numbers along the southern California coastal plain in Fall. Unlike the Plumbeous Vireo, this was a lifer. Also unlike our recent Plumbeous Vireo, it was not very obliging. It was foraging among leaves about 50' up in a Eucalyptus and I only saw it for a little while before it flew off. So, still a bird I'd like to see more clearly, again (with Libby, hopefully!).