One of my guilty pleasures of late has been the Bobcat Bite restaurant situated a few miles east of Santa Fe off I-25.  Aside from the obviously huge juicy burgers, they also have a large counter where I can watch their bird feeders at close range.  Although nothing unusual has ever popped up at these feeders, they do offer a nice bit of birding entertainment while I wait for and devour my burger.  Canyon Towhee, Juniper Titmouse, Pine Siskin, and House Finches are all my dinner companions for the duration of any visit here.  The staff knows me well and enjoy the fact I’m a birder when another diner asks about the birds.  They know I am always happy to let them get back to work and answer the other patron’s questions for them.  Anyway, if you are ever in the Santa Fe region it is worth the short drive out of town to eat one of these famous burgers and watch the local bird species flutter around the feeder just outside the window.

A cheeseburger was last night’s indulgence and today’s was some Sunday morning birding.  Still not overly familiar with the area regarding birds and local hotspots, I set out north of Española for a drive around the San Juan Pueblo.  I found an unassuming paved road and went for it.  Along the drive I found lots of great species and one life bird.  The area was a little rundown and I wasn’t about to leave my car, but birding from the car window isn’t that foreign to me anyway.  I found plenty of great species including Green-tailed Towhee, Western Tanager, and Black Phoebe.  However, my one life bird in this stretch, a Lewis’s Woodpecker, came at a bad time and I was unable to enjoy the sighting.  It was clearly perched on a telephone pole and posing very stoically.  Any other location and I would have watched until the bird flew, but I was in a rural area of the Pueblo and afraid to linger.  My angle to the bird’s location was uncomfortable for me because of the proximity to surrounding trailers (barred windows and lots of junked cars abound).  The last thing I need is some hick thinking I was scoping out his house or a peeping tom.  So it was just easier to move along a little disappointed and see what else I could find.

I eventually ended up at the old San Juan bridge.  Listed as a birding hotspot, I had my doubts.  Regardless of these feelings, I parked and set out to see what I could find.  Much to my amazement, I found the area to be very active with birds.  I located plenty of local species and a couple migrating birds.  This included a dozen or more Wilson’s Warblers and a Spotted Sandpiper on the bank of the Rio Grande.  I managed to get a great look at an empidonax and I am relatively certain that it was a Dusky Flycatcher (a lifer).  I had long, up-close, and well lit looks. So I did my best to work this one out.  I like to say that empidonax flycatchers make my eyes bleed, but I’ll count this one based on region, habitat, season, and plenty of looks that allowed me to go back and forth between the bird and my field guides.  Give me kudos, many birders (including myself) when faced with an empidonax will just move along and not even bother with it.  I was determined with this one, hope I got it right.

I also witnessed a behavior I have never seen before today.  I watched a Yellow Warbler on the bridge plucking free meals from the spiderwebs between the railing.  It was just sitting there enjoying an easy meal at the expense of some spider’s hard work.  I found this fascinating and watched the bird hop along the rail from web to web cleaning out all the insects that were caught the night before.  It was a lot of fun to watch.

I suppose I owe this hotspot an apology.  I doubted it’s viability based on my own negative attitude towards NM.  I think I’ll go back there a few more times before I leave here.  If for no other reason than to hone my skills and practice digiscoping once I have all my equipment.  There were no other people and I could see the truck from the bridge, that made me feel like it was my own personal hotspot to explore.  Now I’m anxious to return.

Life Birds-

        Lewis’s Woodpecker

        Dusky Flycatcher