Our new store location off of Black Drive has a beautiful conference room that we are using to host a variety of free workshops and presentations. This past week I taught a class on shorebird identification, and the following day I led a store-sponsored bird walk down to the Riparian Preserve in Gilbert, to practice shorebird identification.
You might be wondering why we would go all the way to Gilbert to look at shorebirds. To prepare for the field trip, I looked at the eBird checklist to see what varieties of shorebirds have been observed at that location. There were twenty-nine species listed for the preserve! The variety of species included stilt, avocet, plovers, whimbrel, curlew, godwit, dowitcher, snipe, and a variety of sandpiper species. Now you know why we went all the way to Gilbert!
While we have several man-made lakes in the Prescott area, they are used mostly by waterfowl, rather than shorebirds. Your next question is probably, “What’s the difference between waterfowl and shorebirds?” That is a great question!
Typically, waterfowl are bird species that float on the surface of the water, in open bodies of water. We see a lot of these kinds of species at both Watson and Willow Lakes. Examples of waterfowl include swans, geese and ducks. In contrast, shorebirds, as their name implies, are usually found at the margins of bodies of water—at the shoreline, or in shallow water and mudflats.
Most (but not all) shorebirds have long legs for wading in shallow water, where they feed by either probing their beaks down into the muddy soil or by picking insects and invertebrates from the surface of the soil or water.
Shorebird identification can be tricky, as many species look similar in appearance. Several years ago, I was birding from a boardwalk in Bolsa Chica, California. Having lived in Arizona most of my life, I wasn’t confident in my shorebird identification skills. At one point I ran into another birder on the boardwalk, and she asked me if I knew the identification of some of the shorebirds in the estuary.
I replied, “No, I’m not very good at shorebird identification. I’m from Prescott, Arizona,” implying I didn’t have a lot of experience identifying shorebirds because I was from Arizona. Her reply surprised me, “I’m from Prescott, too!” Talk about a small world! Fortunately, my shorebird identification skills have improved from those earlier days.
While our objective last week was to see shorebirds, we encountered an unexpected obstacle—high water. Since shorebirds prefer mudflats and shallow water, the depth of the water in the retention basins prevented many shorebird species from foraging in the ponds.
I’ve been to the Riparian Preserve countless times over the last twenty years, and this was the first time I had ever seen the ponds so full. Needless-to-say, I was both surprised and disappointed. I was fully expecting to see a lot of shorebirds, but we only found six species—black-necked stilt, American Avocet, long-billed dowitcher, Wilson’s snipe, greater yellowlegs and a few least sandpipers.
We missed seeing some really common shorebirds such as killdeer and spotted sandpiper. It just goes to show, you never know what you will see or what you won’t see! However, we had a great day, tallying over sixty species in about three and a half hours. I highly recommend birding at the Gilbert Water Ranch.
On a separate note, nesting balls are now in stock, and it is the perfect time to hang them out in the yard. Anna’s hummingbirds are already starting to nest, and a variety of other species will use the nesting material as well.
Until next week, Happy Birding!
Eric Moore is the owner of The Lookout, in Prescott, where you will find a Hallmark Gold Crown Store, wild bird products, and Vortex and Swarovski optics. Eric has been an avid birder for over 55 years. Eric can be contacted at eric@thelookoutaz.com.
