We see Red in the Southwest

27 Feb We see Red in the Southwest

posted Feb 27, 2026 from Seattle, WA.

This Northern Cardinal was one of two singing at Dunagan’s Crossing in the bootheel of New Mexico.

This Vermillion Flycatcher was at Cochise Lake in Arizona on Feb 12 2026.

Here’s a closer shot.

We encountered thousands of beautiful Sandhill Cranes at Cochise Lake and in the bootheel of New Mexico. These were staging in the mist at Cochise Lake on a magical evening at Cochise Lake.

A closeup.

House Finches have expanded to or been introduced in much of the US but in the Southwest they are a bona fide Native species. They also get redder as you head south toward the south end of their range past Mexico City.

This Cinnamon Teal appeared to be lording it over the Wigeon at Cochise Lake.

Of course, not all the Birds were red, this Western Bluebird was up the canyon from the house in the New Mexico bootheel.

And these Yellow-headed Blackbirds were at Cochise Lake in Willcox, Arizona, also.

Let’s throw in some white birds, these are Ross’s Geese at Cochise.

Rain was clearing, sadly, as we arrived but off and on rain continued through the night. Here sunlight hits the San Simon Valley floor to the southwest.

We take two days getting in to the ranch from Seattle. Rain transforms everything and here rain clouds work their way over Eagle Mountain.

We spend a magical day in Hidalgo County with expert Chuck Hathcock

We picked up professional Biologist, Snake expert and Bird Man, Hidalgo-county-leading (on ebird) Chuck Hathcock at his home in Rodeo, New Mexico and toured the county. He showed us where the Ferruginous Hawks like to hang out in Hidalgo, and we saw about 5, four more than we’d ever seen in the county in one day before. Ferruginous is the largest Buteo Hawk in the US, a Great Plains specialist that doesn’t need tall trees or poles but uses them now that people have put them in its habitat. This is a male, the smaller gender, as always, of this raptor species.

Next Chuck showed us where some migrating Mountain Plovers were hanging out. This is one of the Birds that used to follow the Buffalo. It has had a more difficult time since the elimination of the traveling Buffalo herds. Delia and I had only seen one ever, a Bird that migrated to its own drummer and spent one winter out at Griffiths-Priday Beach north of Copalis. That bird wasn’t shy and we were blown away by how cute it was up close.

Next stop was a hidden canyon at the northern border of Hidalgo County. A Canyon Wren greeted us at the rim of the canyon and its beautiful ringing song could be heard from the walls when we got down to the bottom.

This Golden Eagle rose slowly, struggling to find a thermal rising up along the canyon wall, but it never stooped so low as to flap its wings.

Chuck had found a Nutting’s Flycatcher in this canyon which is a tremendously rare sighting in the United States. We got there perhaps on the first day after it flew off at night, perhaps heading to points south where a Nutting’s Flycatcher could socialize. I regret that I cannot show off a photo of this Bird, but that’s the deal with Birding, you don’t always get your Bird, and we do not have a moment of regret for the wonderful time we spent looking for it, finding Cardinals, Solitaires, Bluebirds, Gnatcatchers and these next birds: White-throated Swifts, in the process.

This Swift was too fast for me and my little Powershot to get the action in focus. But it clearly shows: This Bird is built for speed!

And this is Delia in the “Box.” (a box canyon on the Gila).

This is a photograph by Delia Scholes from the rim of the box. The river has cut away the rock to such an extent that it passes underneath. The visible trees are mostly Black Cottonwood, the usual riparian tree of the West along with Sycamore in the Southwest. But there are also patches of Hackberry forest, which is apparently what the Nutting’s Flycatcher was interested in.

These Avocets were in the Lordsburg Playa. The best thing about the visit were the visible signs of good winter rains this year after the Southwest had been hammered with an unprecedented drought last summer. The Lordsburg Playa had water, and it created an emotional sight as we drove along I-10 in places between Lordsburg and Road Forks and could see standing water on both sides of the road, to the north as far as the eye could see.

Over the two week trip to AZ and NM, we found 110 Birds including this somewhat-rare (female) Olive Warbler that was up the draw from the house. We were thrilled about the winter rains. But the effects of the 20 year-drought– that has intensified in the last four years and especially last summer–are everywhere. About half of the Pinon Pines in our canyon are now dead, as are about half of the Manzanita bushes. Birds that we expect appear to have disappeared or seriously declined. Most obviously the Loggerhead Shrike, normally evident on wires and power poles across the region, seems now to have become suddenly rare. As have Cactus Wrens and Canyon Wrens (other than Gila Box). We failed to see a single Road-runner–normally we would have seen several. The Mammals seem notably absent, we saw no Black-tailed Jackrabbits, not many Cottontails, and only one White-tailed Deer. (Delia saw a Coatimundi and we saw one Coyote.) Golden Eagles live by the Mammals so it didn’t surprise us not to see any Eagles except that one at the Box. Red-naped Sapsuckers, Mountain Bluebirds, Scaled Quail and even Gambel’s Quail seem down also–we didn’t see any of those. These are just anecdotal observations and we are nothing close to experts on the Bird life of the area or what is happening to it, but we are definitely running scared. For years people talked about climate change in terms of global warming. Warming itself dries the land, but “warming” always sounded deceptively benign. Dessication doesn’t sound so benign. The idea that it would just stop raining in some places where it had always rained (the Southwestern Monsoons are, or have been, among the most reliable of weather patterns in the world) wasn’t in the air.

The photo above I’m calling “The Luck of the Draw.” In the draw just a tenth of a mile up from the house, these two Manzanita bushes had been making their stand. The summer of 25 killed one but the other not only survived, it looks perfectly healthy.

Like the surviving Manzanita–although with much less on the line here–I can’t let go of some hope and optimism. Some Birds appear to be doing fantastic, including Spotted Towhees, and the wintering Sparrow flocks which are back this year. But for the sake of a healthy ecosystem, there will have to be a monsoon or something like it this summer. The normal start date for that is mid or late June. I have been known to check radar 10 times a day during monsoon season, (compulsive behavior that helps not at all, I realize), hoping to see if rain is falling on this beautiful land. I’m writing this as a system is bringing rain and crucial snow to Washington, perhaps enough to save the water year, and I’m hoping for something similar for the beautiful Southwest.