After a fabulous time at the Grand Canyon, we drove up to Page, AZ yesterday afternoon so that we could have an early visit to Antelope Canyon this morning. Our scheduled visit time wasn’t crazy early, however, so my sister and I had time to go out looking for wildlife on the golf course in town beforehand.
As we approached the course just a bit before the sun came over the high horizon in the east, we noticed that it was covered with dark shapes. Once we got close enough and the sun finally crested the ridge, look who made up about 2/3rds of those dark shapes: white-faced ibises (Plegadis chihi)! Holy smokes! They are our first ever, and they were frantically foraging for morsels in the grass just as I see ring-billed gulls forage on the southern soccer fields in Estabrook Park. As soon as one found something, all its nearby buddies hurried over to help.
The other 1/3rd of the dark shapes turned out to be mountain cottontails (Sylvilagus nuttallii).
Above the grass, and making a bit of a racket, was a trio of darling western kingbirds (Tyrannus verticalis), another first for us.
In the natural growth beside the fairway, we found my sister’s first rock wren;
at the edge of a rock outcropping, we spotted her first greater roadrunner;
and in the tall bushes overhead, we found her first black-chinned hummingbird, and my first adult male.
Then we had to go for our scheduled slot-canyon tour, which was amazing, and when we emerged at the “upstream” end of the slot, look who was there to greet us, our very first lark sparrow (Chondestes grammacus). Ha!
Finally, your blossoms of the day are these gorgeous buds on what I believe is a smallflower fishhook cactus (Sclerocactus parviflorus)
We’re now in Utah and planning to visit Arches National Park tomorrow, which I hear is nice, but before we get to that, I can’t wait to see who’s around when the sun comes up.
Signs of Life in Estabrook Park 