Wally's Birds: January 2026

Wednesday, January 7, 2026

Freestone Park

The Gilbert Freestone Park is a well planned park with two lakes that attract a lot of Birds and people. It is a great place to visit for a family picnic.

1/7/2026

I went to play pickleball with Spencer at Freestone Recreation Center. As we were walking in a little hummingbird perched on a branch not far from where we were. Spencer had download Merlin on his phone and listened. It identified it as an Anna's Hummingbird. We looked at the picture and then at the bird to verify Merlin was right. Thanks to Spencer, I added an elusive hummingbird to my list.

Anna's Hummingbird

It wasn't as colorful as the above picture. I think it was an immature male like this:

Relatively large-headed and chunky. Gray and green overall, lacking buffy or orangey tones. Males have shocking magenta head, which appears dark when not catching the light. Females have dingy grayish underparts and often show a dark patch in the center of the throat. Note relatively short, straight bill compared with Black-chinned or Costa’s Hummingbird. Common year-round in the Pacific states of the U.S., mainly in relatively open or scrubby habitats including desert scrub and chaparral. Frequently seen in suburban yards and gardens, often visiting sugar water feeders. Expanding its range northward into British Columbia, even regular in southeast Alaska. Winters to southern Baja and locally elsewhere in Mexico. Listen for male’s scratchy, metallic song, given when perched.

This is one of my favorite sightings because it is so elusive and small. I am now at 30 species for the year!

1/9/26 Edith and I were sitting on a bench near one of the lakes and spotted these two new species.

Green Heron

Usually in a crouched position, partly concealed in vegetation, waiting patiently for prey.

Black-crowned Heron

Often crouched under overhanging branches during the day. Feeds nocturnally for fish, frogs and other prey.

Tuesday, January 6, 2026

Blue Point Bridge--ARIZONA

33.55809384747576, -111.58155677274682

When I was a young lad, sheep herders would guide up to 2,000 sheep at a time up into the hills near Punkin Center on the lower Tonto Creek for the summer and back to the valley for winter forage in the alfalfa fields in Gilbert. You would NOT dare let a cow feed in an alfalfa field because it would gorge itself and alfalfa has highly digestible leaves that release soluble proteins and sugars that feed microbes in the cow's stomach and the microbes produce a slimy foam that traps gases like methane and CO2 in the cow's stomach that prevents normal belching. The cow eventually dies of suffocation.

The bridge was eventually removed around 1975.

Edith, Spencer and Easton went with me on this bird hunting expedition and we found a few posts that were probably part of the fencing they used to control the sheep.

There were a lot of interesting geologic formations. This is one that seemed to be the remains of hot flowing lava. (birders always have binoculars in their hand)

This is such a beautiful area. I don't know why I never took the family hiking and camping in this area the decades we were raising kids.

My ears were a little stuffed on the day we went, 6 January 2026 so I couldn't hear the birds that singing around us. But Spencer, Easton and Edith are natural birders! With their help and little investigative work we identified two more birds for my list.

Spotted Sandpiper

Rock Wren

I'm not real sure I had a legitimate find for the "Rock Wren", but I will count it because I may not be this way again and Spencer and Easton tended to agree this was the bird.

The last bird we identified was a Black-chinned Hummingbird.

Black-chinned Hummingbird

This was truly an amazing sighting that would not have happened without Spencer and Easton's help. The little bird didn't cooperate. It flitted from bush to tree and back again never stopping for a good look----until it couldn't resist the nectar from a Chapurosa Bush and it's bright pink/red bell-shaped flowers. We got one good look at him while he had his long beak inserted into a little Chapurosa Bush flower.

However, it was such a flitting look we had to do some more research. Merlin suggested several different humming birds that were possibilities, but the fact it was feeding on the Chapurosa Bush was a clue.

(I added the Chuparosa Bush to my list of found plant species)

Science claims the Black-chinned Hummingbird and the Chuparosa Bush co-evolved together each depending on the other. The bird for food adapted a long narrow beak and the plant for pollination adapted a bell-shaped flower just perfect for the little Black-Chinned Hummingbird.

I had a great day with Edith, Spencer and Easton on a beautiful Arizona desert trail!

Phon-D-Sutton--Salt River, Arizona

33.54822418188218, -111.65417028470912

I went on a day hike with Nathan, my son, and his daughter Amy to look for birds and plants. It was a beautiful day.

We hiked for a short distance on the open desert. The desert is SO beautiful. It was nice to get reacquainted with some of the plants:

Santa Rita Prickly pear

There are a lot of different varieties of prickly pear on the desert.

Mulenberg's Stippleback Lichen

You often see this lichen growing on rocks in the desert.

Then we drove to the Phon-D-Sutton picnic area and walked along the Salt River. The river had very little water in it.

It was a successful day in more ways than one, but I added two new species to my list--the Great Blue Heron and a beautiful Bald Eagle flying overhead!

Great Blue Heron

Bald Eagle

EL RIO PRESERVE-TUCSON, ARIZONA

EL RIO PRESERVE--TUCSON ARIZONA

32.392036635639535, -111.13944253497408

Edith and I visited the Hancock family 31 December 2025 and while there we visited the "El Rio Preserve". Unfortunately we were not there long enough to identify and new birds, even though there were some we didn't recognize.

Earlier in the day I went by myself to the Wade McClean Neighborhood park where I located a Gila Woodpecker.

32.35591645339281, -111.1059476675198

I wasn't close enough to get a good picture, but Merlin could hear it's call, identified it and showed me a picture that I matched by looking through my binoculars. This was a rare find for me that I am glad to capture before I went back to Washington state.

Gila Woodpecker

GILBERT RIPARIAN PARK

During a 3-month stay in Arizona December to end of February, we visited the Gilbert Riparian Park and sited a lot of birds.

The most enjoyable part was having Spencer and Easton join us on one of our visits. I think I got Spencer excited about doing a "Big Year". He has the Merlin app and is collecting sightings.