With binoculars and camera, Sparky heads off to beautiful Box Canyon in southeast Arizona. Only a few miles from the world-famous Madera Canyon, Box Canyon hosts some dry hillside species that are rare in most of this area. In fact, a cooperative and bold Five-striped Sparrow perches nicely for Sparky right off the rugged road that traverses Box Canyon.

Sparky also finds a nest of a pair of animated Thick-billed Kingbirds, but one of the babies is not quite ready to fledge.

Walking a random wash in the canyon leads to a close-up encounter with a Varied Bunting. Multiple evenings were spent with new friends listening for the CODE 3 Buff-collared Nightjar. This would be a Lifer…but did Sparky hear it? You’ll have to watch to see.

One stormy night yields a friendly Tarantula, and a 3-foot Black-tailed Rattlesnake sporting its lovely green scales.

Madera Canyon in southeast Arizona is a legendary birding location…and the bird photography isn’t bad either! I spend parts of two days in this “sky island” canyon on this mid August trip.

Berylline Hummingbird is a Mexican bird species that occasionally shows up in southeast Arizona. The American Birding Association (ABA) labels it a Code 3 rarity. It would be a Lifer for me. Will I see it? The Santa Rita Lodge feeders are alive with hummers including Rufous, Anna’s, Black-chinned.

During the slower parts of the day, I sit at a water hole along the creek, and watch multiple species come in, including a Warbling Vireo. I get a photo, but what I didn’t realize, was that in just two short days, the American Ornithological Society (AOS) would split this species into two—Western Warbling-Vireo and Eastern Warbling-Vireo. A LIFER!

The crimson-bellied flycatcher known as Painted Redstart comes in for a drink, as well as Acorn Woodpecker, White-winged Dove, Plumbeous Vireo and others. Calling its “squeaky toy” song nearby is a Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher, which I manage to get a few photos of in the canopy.

Other Madera Canyon highlights were Bridled Titmouse, Mexican Jay, and Hutton’s Vireo, a species I’ve never photographed before.

NEXT EPISODE—Arizona #3d 

Lifer on the Mexican Border—”Death march into Sycamore Canyon”

In Part 1 of Sparky’s August trip to southeast Arizona, he concentrates on finding the mountain warblers and magnificent hummers of Tucson’s Mount Lemmon. Only a short drive from the city, but a world away as far as habitats, Mount Lemmon rises to over 9,000 feet where pine forests dominate. It is even high enough to get several feet of snow each winter and sustain a downhill skiing area! The mountain is an example of a “Sky Island,” one of several of these isolated mountains/mountain ranges rising up from the deserts of southeast Arizona. The 27 mile Santa Catalina Highway traverses multiple habitats/biomes and provides dozens of excellent birding locations.

The Palisades Visitor Center at 7,950 feet is a great stop to see hummingbirds up close. On this visit Sparky finds dozens of noisy Rufous Hummingbirds (including one single adult male in stunning coppery plumage), several red-throated “zinging” Black-chinneds and a few rosy-headed Anna’s. A magnificent Rivoli’s Hummer joins the party as well, showing off its iridescent purple and teal feathers.

Sparky shares a couple unique photography techniques to capture the beauty and speed of these unique hummingbirds. Shooting video at 1/5000 of a second frame rate can yield some stunning still images.

Then down at Rose Lake Canyon Sparky stumbles on a nice wave of Mountain Chickadees, Pygmy Nuthatches, and Bushtits. Amongst them are several high elevation “mountain” warblers at eye-level including Grace’s, Black-throated Gray, and a stunning Red-faced Warbler.

At the end of the video, Sparky shares his favorite images of this episode.

In the next episode (SE AZ Part 2) Sparky travels to Madera Canyon. Will he get his Lifer Berryline Hummingbird? And what is that strange mammal coming down the path?

Southeast Arizona Birding—August 10-16, 2025

In early August I brought Bjorn down to spend a week at his grandma’s farm in Illinois. But instead of making the 18-hour round trip drive twice in seven days, I instead flew from Peoria to Tucson for some monsoon season desert birding.

It was a bizarre pre-dawn drive on the rough Ruby Road to get to the remote Sycamore Canyon. The only cars that I saw were 7(!) Border Patrol trucks. Obviously this is a commonly used route for migrants. 

Connor and Alex, grad students at Texas A&M had arrived just before me, along with a couple Border Patrol agents on foot. They took off at a quick pace while I took my time along the trail…or maybe I should write “trail,” since it was often barely perceptible which way one should go. It is a fairly flat trail but the heat, lack of signage and uneven substrate make it a challenging journey.

Alex and Connor gave me a GPS location and a good habitat description on their way out, but Google Earth was not connecting in this remote valley and I overshot the spot. I knew it was like 1.75 miles int the canyon but I “overthunk” it and ended up doing some risky boulder scrambling to get around a steep dry waterfall slope and rock cliff.

Then suddenly a Border Patrol helicopter popped over the cliffs above and buzzed down the canyon and over my head. I know they are used to occasional birders so ignored me. Odd feeling to be in such a remote place all alone and have a helicopter check you out.

But I get it…this must be a well-used crossing point. I saw much sign of folks traveling through this canyon: abandoned canteen with home-sewn bluejean cover, tuna packets, random clothes, Red Cross blanket. 

Finally I turned around. It just didn’t feel like this was the spot Alex and Connor had described. They also said it was singing so I was listening for the song and its call chip note, which to me sounds like that of a Junco. After another sketchy rock scramble and a half mile hike back up down the canyon I heard the call note.

There it was! A male in all his glory…lemon yellow with a stout bill and namesake rufous cap. I got to spend a grand total of 37 seconds with him before he flitted off through the wash-side brush. ABA area lifer number 658! (or so…I need to redo my checklist).

Rufous-capped Warbler is a Mexican species that only rarely shows up in the U.S. and when it does, almost always in SE Arizona.

I plopped down on a rock on the hillside and just waited and watched for another 45 minutes or so, but the Rufous-capped did not show again. The Border Patrol agents did pass by but evidently did not see me only 20 yards away.

It was now getting quite hot. I met a few other die hards on their way in to find the warbler. I helped one young guy who had gotten off the trail and was a bit turned around (easy to do here!).

Other highlights: Rock Wrens, Rufous-crowned Sparrow, singing and close-up Canyon Wrens, Clark’s Spiny Lizard, Elegant Earless Lizard, and a very unexpected Black Vulture(!), an eastern species that I learned has a tiny outpost in SE Arizona including Sycamore Canyon. Also a sad but interesting find…Road-kill Hognosed Skunk.

**I am working on my YouTube videos about this Arizona trip, so stay tuned!

I’ve already posted my favorite “Bird-in-the-Landscape” photos, and Top Twelve Mammals of 2019, so now it is time for my Best Bird Portraits of the year. It is a fun exercise going through all the photos from the year and coming up with the best of the best…especially when you didn’t think you had such a great photographic year.

I hadn’t been birding in Southeast Arizona for many years, so this June I headed down to reacquaint myself with birds of the Chihuahuan and Sonoran desert. Even the very common Gambel’s Quail was a treat to see after these many years. Their call (as this guy is performing) is memorable and distinctive.

What I really wanted this day was a photo of a mated pair of Western Grebes performing their courtship “run-across-the-water” dance performance. But the water was too choppy for that, but I did get a nice portrait of a spectacular bird.

Any time I can get birds in a field of flowers it is almost surely going to make a pleasing image. This adult and colt was molting into their winter gray from their iron-stained summer plumage.

A kayak provides an eye-level vantage for photographing hard-to-reach water birds …but it is also a difficult platform to work from since the kayak tends to spin once stopped. But I was able to get this shot of a Forster’s Tern on its nest with its reflection in the water.

I like the leading line of the branch and how the hummingbird’s wing is almost an extension of the sweep of the branch. The Rivoli’s Hummingbird’s iridescent feathers show well in this image high up in the Arizona Mountains.

See more Arizona hummingbird photos here

It is only a House Finch, but I like the shape of the Ocatillo’s stalks and how the red blossom stalks match the bird’s plumage. The blue sky doesn’t hurt either!

House Finches are native to the western U.S. but were introduced to the East Coast in the 1940s (?). The arrived in Minnesota by the late 1980s but are still not extremely common.

Males battle on the dancing lek of the Greater Prairie Chickens. Battles are brief and often end in an aerial skirmish. I was in a blind from well before sun-up until all the males left at mid morning.

See more photos from my morning at the Prairie Chicken lek here

Not much of a photo huh? No it’s not technically a good bird photo but I included it because it is one of North America’s most rarely seen bird, and taken at 11pm in complete darkness in a cattail/sedge marsh with about a million mosquitos around my head. Plus, I was holding a flashlight in one hand and my camera in the other!

Read more about this adventure here (and see the video).

Talk about well camouflaged! I have other photos that are tighter and more portrait-like, but I like this photo because it shows how their spotted plumage hides them in the dappled sunlight.

See more Spotted Owl photos here

How cute are these little guys? I like their tiny top knots. One of the fun things to do in Southeast Arizona is to sit at a feeding station and just wait and see what comes in. I probably saw 25 species of birds in a couple hours while sitting in a lawn chair.

Another Southeast Arizona bird I hadn’t seen in ages…the Elegant Trogon. I was tipped off to a nest location so I spent a fair amount of time watching mom and dad come and go. The nest cavity was hard to see and I only had one tiny opening to get a photo. This is about the only decent image I got, but I did get video as well.

See more photos from the Cave Creek/Portal area of Arizona here

Another image of a Prairie Chicken battle. I like the blurred wing and unusual pose of this male.

See the VIDEO of my morning at the Prairie Chicken lek here

Too bad I wasn’t a bit closer when I took this photo. It is highly cropped. But I love the two baby Red-necked Grebes…especially the one peaking out from its mom’s wings.

June 6-12, 2019

We don’t really think of high elevation mountains right near the Mexican border in Arizona, but these “Sky Islands” rise to over 8,000 feet in elevation. And they host a completely different set of flora and fauna.

Here is a sampling of critters and flowers from two such Sky Islands—Rustler Park in the Chiricahua Mountains (outside of Portal, AZ) and Hunter Canyon in the Heuchuca Mountains near Sierra Vista, AZ.

Even though I was at 8,000 feet elevation, there was still cactus in full bloom.

The Mexican Chickadee that is only found in a few places in the U.S.
[Coronado National Forest]

Rustler Park at 8,000 feet in the Chiricahua Mountains. It was formerly a better site for birding until a massive wildfire burned the area several years ago.

Juncos with yellow eyes? These close-relatives of our Dark-eyed Junco are restricted to the very southeast corner of Arizona and extreme southwest New Mexico. They are only found at high elevations. There were several pairs here in Rustler Park (8,000 feet) and they were finding caterpillars under the needle duff layer.

HUNTER CANYON near Sierra Vista is our second stop on the blog post about the higher elevations of southeast Arizona.

I got an early start to make the hike up to Hunter Canyon to look for a reported Rufous-capped Warbler. I hiked up an easy trail that gave me good looks at Arizona Woodpecker and Spotted Towhee, but it wasn’t getting anywhere near any large pines…plus folks had said that the hike to the Rufous-capped Warblers was a beast. This must be the wrong trail…And, yes, I was on the wrong trail.

I finally made it back to my car and found the correct parking area. Now this hike was straight up the mountain! Must be the right trail. As I reached the pines, I ran into three birders from Maryland that I’d birded with near Portal. They had had no luck in finding the warbler, but a while later they discovered a roosting “Mexican” Spotted Owl! It was only about 20 feet up in a maple along the creek. He was resting but allowed us a few minutes of photos and gawking. A real find and a beauty. I’d seen one in 1994 but this was much closer.

Patagonia is a very small town that looms large in the legacy of American birding. It is a must-bird site for all visiting birdwatchers. I hit two of the most famous spots; Paton Center for Hummingbirds (formerly the home of Wally and Marion Paton and their plethora of hummingbird feeders) and the Patagonia-Sonoita Creek Sanctuary.

June 6-8 near Portal, Arizona.

During my brief stay in Portal, I birded multiple biomes….from mountain pine forest (at elevation 8,400 feet!) to low elevation Chihuahuan Desert scrub. The desert was most alien to this Minnesota boy, and maybe that was its strong appeal. It was also easier to see and photograph the critters than in the wooded habitats.

Foothills Road is very near Portal and a great place to explore at dawn and dusk. Midday is quiet due to the heat. On this road I had great looks at Scott’s Oriole, Cactus Wren, Gambel’s Quail, Scaled Quail, Verdin, Black-tailed Gnatcatcher, Lesser Nighthawk (dusk), Desert Cottontail and Black-tailed Jackrabbit.

Stateline Road is another great birding road. New Mexico will be on the east and Arizona on the west side of the road. Stop at Willow Tank and bird this water feature as well. I saw Loggerhead Shrike, Ash-throated Flycatcher, Curve-billed Thrasher, Greater Roadrunner, Chihuahuan Raven and possibly a Kit Fox (just a long-tailed blur running across the road).

I hadn’t birded southeast Arizona since 2004…15 years ago…and I needed to get back. Between 1990 and 2004 I made 4 birding/photo trips here and picked up most of my target southeast Arizona specialists plus rarities such as White-eared Hummingbird, Plain-capped Starthroat, Rose-throated Becard, Flame-colored Tanager, and Black-capped Gnatcatcher. But in those pre-digital-photography days I took few photos and my memories of specific bird sightings had long since faded. So nearly every bird I saw was a special treat…almost like getting lifers all over again.

My first two nights were in Portal, Arizona near the New Mexico border at the foot of the Chiricahua Mountains. You can experience multiple biomes in the vicinity of Portal, all within a short drive. This post is about birding in the Cave Creek and Herb Martyr Canyon areas.

**All photos taken with Panasonic GH5 and Sony A6500 with Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, Canon 70-200mm f4 lens, Rokinon 10mm lens, and iPhone.