Much like my elaborate scheme to get paid to go birding in Central America by joining the Peace Corps, my decision to join a bird crew in the southern great plains was really a ploy to go birding in Big Bend National Park and add species to my life list. Similar to my time in Panama, it resulted in seeing lots of cool birds but also developing an Achilles injury and randomly fainting in a public library. As they say, no pain, no cranes.
I was hesitant at first, mainly due to a 90’s National Geographic tornado documentary that I watched at far too young of an age. The fun thing about being a naturally anxious person is that the thing you’re worried about doesn’t have to happen for you to feel miserable about it. This was not helped when I killed a few hours at the Big Well Museum (the 8th Wonder of Kansas!) I was led to believe it would be a museum about a big well. Which it was, but mainly about how the town around the big well was flattened by a tornado in 2007. The woman who sold me my ticket asked me if I was in town to chase the tornado that was in the forecast, the existence of which was news to me. That night, as I lay in my tent listening to the wind whip the nylon around, I googled “tornado shelters near me” with distressingly few results.
That said, apart from the weather anxiety and the high summer temperatures, the southern great plains have some great birding potential. It’s an underbirded region. Sadly, most of the prairie has been converted by agriculture, making true patches of native grassland few and far between. It makes it even more precious when you do stumble across a handkerchief of little bluestem or a playa lake filled to bursting with phalaropes.
Spring migration in the central flyway is a spectacle of color and sound. Shorebirds like upland sandpipers (famously represented in Brittney Spears’ hit single UPSA Did It Again) and mountain plovers. Painted buntings clad in bright colors like tiny Montessori kids. Mixed species flocks of sparrows that render any little brown job worthy of a second look in case it’s something unexpected. A lot of these species are common in the eastern U.S. and the Midwest, but to me, as someone from the Rockies, they were all new. The first time I saw a northern cardinal I nearly drove off the road, as my dad is wont to do when he sees an interesting culvert.
In the past, I’ve said some unkind things about the great plains. Maybe I was fussy because it was hot. Maybe it’s because one morning I mistook my tube of sunscreen for toothpaste when I was gettin ready in the dark. Maybe it’s because the endless fields of corn are demoralizing, a poor imitation of what used to be there. In honor of the great plains, buckle up for another chapter of needlessly complicated mnemonics that I like to use. This time, I’m focusing on the birds you might see in shrubby edges.
First off, the painted bunting. They wear red and green motley, with a blue hat, and are somehow really tricky to get your eyes on. They sing an obsequious, weedling song, like a court jester coming up with a clever little pun to poke fun of a temperamental warlord’s economic policy
Then, the blue grosbeak. The cadence is similar to a painted bunting, but slower and stiffer. The overall sound quality is deeper and more resonant, thanks to their large bills. They remind me of an amateur actor in a Shakespearean production trying to keep to iambic pentameter.
In the shrubs, keep your ears tuned for Bell’s vireo. They sound like a record scratch.
White-eyed vireos are charming little skulkers that sing “Here, bring me a beer now, Chuck.”
