What I mean by my “last” woodpecker is that, until a few days ago, Nuttall’s Woodpecker was the only woodpecker species normally occurring in North America north of Mexico that I hadn’t seen yet. Up until then I was still looking forward with happy anticipation to seeing that last one. Now I’ve seen ‘em all, so to speak.
No new woodpecker discoveries await me in the so-called ABA area… except the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, still presumed extinct but which I truly believe somehow survives in the southeastern swamplands. Or unless I cross paths with some mega-rare vagrant woodpecker, such as a Great Spotted Woodpecker, when I find myself in the Aleutian Islands or someplace wondrously crazy like that.
Not that Nuttall’s Woodpecker is particularly rare or amazing to see. I just had never visited its habitat until our recent family trip to metro Los Angeles. It’s still a relatively common bird in wooded areas in the foothills and lowlands west of the desert along most of the California coast. Like all remaining natural areas in coastal California these woodlands are under spectacularly intense development pressure and are already mostly gone. But for now the Nuttall’s Woodpecker and its colleagues like the California Thrasher and Oak Titmouse -- also life birds for me on this trip -- are holding their own where their habitat remains. (I also saw three other “lifers” elsewhere in the region: Tricolored Blackbird, Yellow-Billed Magpie and California Gnatcatcher.)
But come to think of it… Yikes! Oak Titmouse was “my last titmouse…” (I’ve seen Juniper Titmouse and Bridled Titmouse in Arizona, and Black-Crested Titmouse in Texas, and Tufted Titmouse visits my feeders. Sigh. It’s inevitable, I guess. I love birding and I love to research and then search out new birds when I travel. Anyplace I end up, I’ve got my binoculars and field guide by my side, along with whatever maps I need, along with a pretty good idea of how to find whatever cool birds happen to be around. Before I hit the ground I’ve studied their calls, field marks, range, habitat and behavior, so I have the best chance to see and appreciate them.
As a result of my high degree of “joyful effort,” as we Buddhists say, I’ve managed to find quite a few of the birds that spend part or all of the year in the US and/or Canada. How many is that? Probably about 720 species or thereabouts, of which I’ve seen perhaps 600. I keep a “life list” but I haven’t ever tallied up how many birds are on it. I guess I kinda don’t want to know how many I’ve seen -- I think I’m afraid I might see them all!
Not that that’s particularly likely, as some of them are incredibly hard to find. I’m thinking in particular of the bird that launched my greatest birding quest and remains my most longed-for sighting-to-be: the Gray-headed Chickadee, or Siberian Tit.
I once ventured to the Mackenzie River delta in the Canadian Arctic with a few other intrepid birders to search for this cute lil’ spudlet, arguably the rarest and most difficult to find of any breeding bird in the US or Canada. For a week in late July we flogged the challenging delta terrain, based on decades-old but credible reports that Gray-headed Chickadees had been seen in the area in August. But for us, it was (except for lots of look-alike Boreal Chickadees) a chickadee-free zone.
When I first started birding I undertook a quest to see all America’s chickadee species: Black-capped, Carolina, Mountain, Chestnut-backed, Boreal, Mexican and Gray-headed. When I was planning my first honeymoon we chose our destination (the Canadian Rockies) based, in part, on its proximity to multiple chickadees species we’d yet to see. They sure were cute and fun to find! And I’m still on that silly and not-at-all-serious quest, despite many, many changes in other areas of my life.
Why is that? That’s possibly a bigger question than I can answer straight off. Partly it’s my lifelong fascination with different habitats and the animals and plants that live there. Partly it’s the challenge of educating myself and walking in new landscapes alert to new things. And partly, it’s how I renew and re-invite my connection with Nature and the non-ordinary realms that lie beyond the physical world we humans are so caught up in.
Partly, too, like many birders I enjoy “listing” and checking off new birds as I see them! I’m not really worried about running out of birds. After all, even as habitat destruction and other factors threatens many species, the American Ornithologists’ Union (AOU) occasionally “makes” a new species by deciding that what was formerly one species is, in the current view, two. This is what enabled me to see the Oak Titmouse, a “new” species recently split (along with Juniper Titmouse) from what formerly was considered one species, the Plain Titmouse.
Ah, birding… isn’t it great!?
Peace and good birding,
Scott Cronenweth
www.naturalpathwalks.com
