Rio Salado

It was a nice cool morning when 12 of us either car-pooled or met at the Rio Salado parking lot on Central Avenue at 7 a.m. and started birding. The best bird of the morning was a Cedar Waxwing, the first one ever seen at Rio Salado according to Tom Gaskill who was passing by and who monitors the birds at Rio Salado. After birding the Central Avenue area, we drove over to 16th Street where we hoped to find some more birds. Most of us then headed home but a few stayed to continue birding 16th Street and the 7th Street areas and they saw several more species.

Here are the 37 species seen or heard: Pied-billed Grebe, Double-crested Cormorant, Neotropic Cormorant, Great Egret, Snowy Egret, Green Heron, Mallard, Osprey, Northern Harrier, Cooper’s Hawk, Red-tailed Hawk, American Kestrel, Gambel’s Quail, American Coot, Killdeer (h), Rock Pigeon, Mourning Dove, Burrowing Owl, Northern Flicker, Black Phoebe, Say’s Phoebe, Cedar Waxwing, Bewick’s Wren, Northern Mockingbird, American Robin, Verdin, European Starling, House Finch, Yellow-rumped Warbler, Abert’s Towhee, Song Sparrow, White-crowned Sparrow, Red-winged Blackbird, Yellow-headed Blackbird, Great-tailed Grackle, Hummingbird unknown species and Swallow unknown species.

The attendees were: Barbara Barnes, Gene Brady, Anne Durning, Marshall Esty, Shirley Fackelman, Darlene Gatto, Kathy Huffman, Richard Kaiser, Vera Markham, Chuck and Loretta Richards and George Wall (leader).