A Tale of Two Chemists: Birding the Sky Islands of Southern Arizona

Birding the Sky Islands of Southern Arizona

Monday 17th - Thursday 20th April 2023

Without the mountains, Southern Arizona would be mostly desert with quite limited biodiversity. However the presence of several mountain ranges which rise to just under 10,000 feet, results in a highly diverse set of habitats that attract a wide variety of plants and animals. The mountains have been termed “sky islands” and represent some of the best birding locations in North America. Over the past four days we have been exploring the canyons and peaks of the Chiricahua and Huachuca mountains, visiting some world renowned birding hotspots such as Cave Creek Canyon and Ramsey Canyon.

Southern Arizona is wildly beautiful. I think we have caught it at a particularly good time as many of the desert plants are blooming and the streams are running well. The temperatures are warm during the day and cool at night, and the sky is unbelievably blue. We arrived at Cave Creek Canyon about an hour after dawn. It was still quite cool and it was magical experience walking up the valley, through thick stands of trees, listening for birds and trying to pin them down. Above the trees, spectacular golden cliffs of rock are visible all around. There were several other birders walking the trails, many of whom were there to try and catch a glimpse of an Elegant Trogon, but although it had been seen on previous days, it didn’t make an appearance that morning. After a few hours, we took a short drive up a dirt road to the Western Research Center and spent some time checking out their hummingbird feeders. It was quite a display and we saw Blue throated, Broad Tailed, Broad Billed, Magnificent (Rivolli’s), Rufous and Black Chinned hummingbirds. A further 8 miles of bumpy, nerve wracking driving up the same dirt road took us up to Rustler Park and the higher mountain elevations. Here there are large pine trees and a whole different set of birds. The area is spectacular but appears to have suffered a lot of storm damage and the campsite itself was closed (permanently?). Given that temperatures during the day are in the mid 80s down on the plains, we were surprised to see that there were still odd patches of snow up in the mountains.

For our first two days visiting Arizona we have been staying at a ranch just to the north of Rodeo, which is actually in New Mexico. It has caused us some confusion because the two states are in the same time zone, but Arizona does not use Daylight Savings Time. We left our AirBNB in New Mexico and arrived 15 minutes earlier in Cave Creek Canyon, Arizona. I felt like Dr Who, but as our phones did / did not adjust the time depending on whether we had cell phone connectivity, we rarely knew what time it actually was! We chose to stay in AirBNB because the camping sites are limited. There are some spectacular sites on public land in cave Creek Canyon, but they are small, very popular and first come - first served. We weren’t at all confident that if we showed up we would find a place. For the second two days we travelled over to Sierra Vista. Driving around southern Arizona it is common to pass through border control checkpoints. With Massachusetts plates and lily-white skin we never had any problems. I spent time contemplating how many hours it might take had they wanted to empty and inspect our car! I suspect hey took one look and came to a similar conclusion!

The main highlight from this part of the trip was visiting Ramsey Canyon. A path runs through a heavily wooded valley with a small stream, before heading up switchbacks to more mountainous terrain. The first section passes through Nature Conservancy land and you need to use their car-park and pay a fee to enter. We had stayed at the Bed and Breakfast at the head of the road many years ago, and remember it well because of the amazing fruit pies that they served their guests in the afternoon. The Inn is now under new management but still looks lovely. When the Nature Conservancy car park was full, we were able to use one of the Inn parking spaces (for a small fee). We saw lots of cool birds in the canyon itself, including a Black Throated Grosbeak and Western Tanager. Up in the higher parts we also saw Red Faced warblers, my favorite bird from this trip. The low point of Sierra Vista was our visit to the waste water treatment plant. You are probably not surprised by this, but it is another well known birding sight We saw a lot of reed beds, an empty pond and hardly any birds!

It’s been at least 12 years since we were last in this area and our impression is that the prime birding locations are much more popular, more developed and less wild than they used to be. We took a drive over to Lake Patagonia, about 50 miles further west. Our memory of visiting here previously is that we arrived at a small parking lot, walked through a gate in a fence and wandered down to the lake. Now there is an extensive State Park with r

oads, campgrounds, marina, launching ramp and even a wooden bridge across one inlet. It’s still lovely, but barely recognizable from what we we remember.

Now we are heading about 50 miles north east of Tucson to spend three nights with Tasha and Mac at the Inn to the west of Aravaipa Canyon. Our bird list of the year stands at ~ 260.

Mike