I left the Slim Buttes on Wednesday and headed for Spearfish Canyon. I got a campsite at Rod and Gun Campground. It has been a few years since I’ve in this part of the hills and it didn’t take long to remember why. There are ATV’s and people everywhere. The development of Roughlock Falls has done nothing but attract more people. Anyone who wants some quiet must be there at sunrise, then one can have a couple of hours of quiet for some birding. At any rate, I was glad to leave. I am back at my quiet spot in the southern Black Hills. It is free (Rod and Gun is $21.50 a night) and quiet. The logging is pretty much over or has moved far to the south. This morning I hiked up Hell Canyon and picked up a Lewis’s Woodpecker for my year list. At Jumpoff Spring I added a Townsend’s Solitaire. I’m up to 330 species now for my year list.
One of my target birds at Roughlock Falls was a Veery, which had been reported on eBird. It didn’t take long to find it early Thursday morning. American Dippers have nested at the falls for many years, probably centuries. I found this one roosting over the waterfall and caught it winking its white eyelid. It is thought that dippers use the white eyelid to signal each other. In their noisy environment, visual signals work better than calls. I also visited Ward Draw, hoping for some other birds I needed and got several Golden-crowned Kinglets. Ward Draw was a pleasant change from Roughlock Falls, no one else was there. In Ward Draw I saw lots of Twinflower, a common flower in spruce forest of the Black Hills. On the Rimrock Trail above Rod and Gun Campground I came across a few Wood Lily. A Bee-mimic Robber Fly. I don’t think I have ever seen one before. This was in Ward Draw.
I’ve been checking out the area, picking up a few more new birds. Yesterday there was an eBird alert on a Cassin’s Kingbird just 20 miles away, so I went to look for it this morning. I did not find it and neither did another birder who came to look for it. Cassin’s Kingbird is quite rare in South Dakota but I saw lots of them in Arizona and New Mexico this spring. I did finally find a Mountain Bluebird though, which brought me up to 324 species.
I found a pair of Long-billed Curlews on the Park Road, they must have had young ones hidden in the grass as they kept harassing me. This may be the best flight shot I’ve ever got of a Long-billed Curlew. A mother Pronghorn with her twins. There are lots of Pronghorns around, this just happened to be close to the road and in nice light!I was at the pond in Deer Draw this morning, when I heard a slurping sound. I crept up to the pond and saw this cow Elk in the water, as soon as she saw me she took off. Photo in bad light. Yellow Avens (Geum aleppicum) with a visiting Nomad Bee. Yellow Avens is a common flower that is native across temperate North America, Europe and Asia. A Badger I saw way out on the prairie, I could not get closer. Weidemeyer’s Admiral on Woodbine. Wilson’s Snipe on a post by a small wetland. The 324th species for my year list, a Mountain Bluebird.
I’m currently in the Slim Buttes of Harding County. I spent a few days at a Shadehill Reservoir campground, near Lemmon, South Dakota. The Grand River National Grassland is in this area and is a good place to get Baird’s Sparrow. I left there this morning and its a good thing as that campground just got hit by a severe thunderstorm, with large hail and strong wind. It is nice here. So far no mosquitoes. I’m up to 322 species of birds for the year now. It is getting harder to find new ones, but I seem to get one or two every day since I left Pierre.
Finding a Caspian Tern was surprisingly difficult but I finally got one on Discovery Island while I was still in Pierre. A wet Baird’s Sparrow. I only saw three and heard several, the Merlin app picked up more but I couldn’t hear them. A very secretive bird that usually hides in the grass, on this morning I found this one on the road, I assume it was avoiding the wet grass. My 322nd species for the year, Trumpeter Swans at the JB Pond. They have nested there for several years now. A fledgling Chestnut-collared Longspur in the rain. I suspect these young birds were having a hard time staying warm. Some seemed quite lethargic. There were lots of them on the road and I saw some dead ones. A distant shot of a Short-eared Owl. This is another species that I haven’t seen for a long time. I’m hoping for some better opportunities!A Wolf Spider carrying her young. A Silvery Blue butterfly, one of the few butterflies I’ve been able to photograph recently. The Grand River National Grassland has an abundance of wild flowers, I selected this one to show, Yellow Sundrops, Oenothera serrulata.A female Lazuli Bunting that posed nicely for me.
My 2024 year bird list keeps growing, but more slowly. I’m up to 310 species now. Perhaps the most exciting was a Scarlet Tanager on LaFramboise Island. Scarlet Tanagers are not very common in this part of the world. A Dunlin was another good find but I had already seen one in Arizona this year so it didn’t add to my species list.
I got this male Scarlet Tanager yesterday. This morning, Rick and Susan went back with me and we found the male and this time a female. I didn’t get any photos better than this one though. Susan spotted a patch of Meadow Anemones, I haven’t seen this plant in flower for a long time so I had to take a photo. A Blue Grosbeak in the shelterbelt behind the house. I had spotted this bird a few days before but this is the first chance I’ve had to photograph it. I made another trip to the Fort Pierre National Grasslands to pick up a few new species. I got some Greater Prairie Chickens and some Chestnut-collared Longspurs. I found a pair of longspurs that were on a prairie dog mound, this female was preening and fluffing out enough to reveal a brood patch. Here’s the male in flight, not the best photo but not too bad either. In the same area, I got 5 Greater Prairie Chickens but they all flushed at a distance so no photos. An Upland Sandpiper walking through the grass, the yellow flowers are buttercups. Another nice find, a Dunlin at the same wetland the Red Knot was found at a couple of weeks ago. There are only two other records in eBird of a Dunlin on the FPNG. Another first for the year, a Field Sparrow. Here’s a Prairie Rattlesnake I came across in the prairie dog colony. I wanted to get it in better light but it went down a hole before I could get it to move. Nothing special, a Common Yellowthroat, but I really like this sharp image as it clings sideways on a cattail stalk.
