Recent Tour Imagery - 2023 June-Aug

Recent 2023 Tours:

The Prairies: North Dakota & Montana with Josh Covill & George Armistead 

Colorado: Best of Summer Birding with George Armistead & Carl Bendorf

Montana: Glacier to Grasslands with Josh Covill

Maine I & II: Acadia’s Iconic Birds, Whales & Scenic Views with Holly Merker & Seth Benz

Colombia: Western Andes & the Choco with George Armistead

Colombia: High Times in the Cordillera Central with George Armistead

Upcoming 2024 Tours to these areas:

Montana Backroads: The Prairies with Josh Covill, 29 May - 5 June Montana Backroads: The Rockies with Josh Covill, 5-12 June

Colorado: Best of Summer Birding with George Armistead & Carl Bendorf (Sold out; message to be added to the waitlist)

Maine: Acadia’s Iconic Birds, Whales & Scenic Views with Holly Merker & Seth Benz 13-17 July

Colombia: High Times in the Cordillera Central with Mollee Brown & Yesennia Tapasco Feb. 9-15

Colombia: Western Andes & the Choco with Mollee Brown & Yesennia Tapasco Feb. 18-24

We begin here with a group shot of one of our two Maine groups. Kneeling are guides, Seth Benz (left) and Holly Merker. We’ll be doing it again 13-17 July of 2024. Basing ourselves at the Schoodic Institute, we visited Mount Desert Island and Acadia National Park, including summiting Mount Cadillac, while also exploring the nearshore waters for whales, Atlantic Puffins, Arctic Terns and more. 

In June we had tours covering North Dakota, Montana and Colorado. Here, Hillstar Nature guide Josh Covill (right) enjoys a laugh with a couple of our Hillstar friends at Bowdoin National Wildlife Refuge in Montana. This is the number one eBird hotspot in the state. It’s a great spot for birds like nesting Wilson’s Phalaropes, Franklin’s Gulls, Eared Grebes, Chestnut-collared Longspurs, and also attracts unusual birds to the area. In 2021 while scouting, Josh and George found the state’s first-ever Cassin’s Sparrow.

A frequent roadside find in Montana is the unique Upland Sandpiper. At times known in the past as Upland Plover, Bartramian Sandpiper, or as the “Papabotte” in Louisiana, in fact this species is most closely related to the curlews. Unlike most other shorebirds/waders, this species is tied to grasslands and their presence is often a good indicator of a healthy grassland. This bird was photographed along the side of the road on The Prairies tour.

A major target of birders visiting the prairies of Montana and North Dakota is the Baird’s Sparrow. In dry years they can be hard to find. The spring of 2023 featured good rains, making for lush prairies and good numbers of this special bird. Preferring tallgrass or mixed prairie, Baird’s is best found on the breeding grounds by listening for its tinkling song, which carries surprisingly well across the grasslands. This species and the Henslow’s Sparrow (nesting in eastern/midwest US) comprise the genus Centronyx. Baird’s winters mostly in north-central Mexico in Chihuahua and Coahuila and in smaller numbers in the southwest US. 

(Photo by George Armistead)

While driving the back roads of eastern Montana, Josh Covill was surprised to spot this newborn Pronghorn nestled into the grass right beside the road. Fawns like this interact with their mother only a few minutes/day, often under a ½ hour all told. This species is the fastest land mammal in the Western Hemisphere, and while they cannot jump really (and climb under barbed wire fencing to get around it) they can reach speeds of 55pmh. They can cover a lot of ground fast, and females can visit the youngsters a couple times each day for nursing. They spend the rest of their time trying not to attract predators to their vulnerable young, or even leading them away from the fawn(s). Despite often being called an “antelope” the Pronghorn is actually the sole remaining member of a family of even-toed ungulates, called Antilocapridae, whose closest living relatives today are the Giraffids (giraffes & the Okapi).

We spent one night exploring the Little Rockies outside of Dodson, Montana, and were lucky to be joined by biologist Andrew Dreelin. Pictured here with his “badgernator”, Andrew and his team of graduate students are studying breeding birds of the prairies like Long-billed Curlew and Mountain Plover, and how they interact with Black-tailed Prairie Dogs. The unique “badgernator” is a remote-controlled mounted badger used to elicit alarm calls from prairie dogs and see how the birds respond to them. The research is fascinating. We hope to have Andrew on Life List: A Birding Podcast soon to discuss his team’s findings.

While the birds and mammals are great in Montana, the scenery often steals show. Here Hillstar friends Jeff & Angela work the road for Marbled Godwits and Brewer’s Sparrow. Behind them rise The Little Rockies.

One night in Minot, North Dakota we dined and sipped wine at a small private art gallery that also produces vintage wines.

We finished The Prairies trip just outside of Bozeman, birding the lower slopes of the Rocky Mountains. Our final outing we enjoyed views of this American Dipper. This is the continent’s only genuinely aquatic songbird, and it’s a member of a family of birds (Cinclidae) with just 5 species. American birders associate this bird strongly with the rushing creeks and rivers of the American West but the species actually ranges broadly, from Alaska all the way to western Panama.

Here in Colorado, looking towards Rocky Mountain National Park we watched a Coyote chase after a family of Canada Geese with nestlings. It was a near miss for the goslings. Hopefully the Coyote found another meal.

Also on the the Best of Summer Colorado tour, co-guide Carl Bendorf took this pic of George Armistead photographing a White-tailed Ptarmigan (just visible, lower right). Our group enjoyed several sightings of this special bird of the alpine tundra, up at about 12,000 feet above sea level.

White-tailed Ptarmigan (same as in above image) on our 2023 Colorado tour, by George Armistead.

These Pale Alpine Forget-me-nots were gorgeous. Also in this area we enjoyed several White-tailed Ptarmigan, as well as Horned Larks, American Pipits, Brown-capped Rosy-Finches, a Golden Eagle, and a few Yellow-bellied Marmots too.

Surely there can be nothing cuter in all the world than a Pika. American Pika is an absurdly charming resident of rocky and scree slopes of the Rocky Mountains. This species is in the family Ochotonidae, which contains over 30 species worldwide. Together with the rabbits they comprise the Lagomorph order. There is one other species in North America, the Collared Pika found in Alaska and northwestern Canada.

Clark’s Nutcracker was featured on both our Montana and Colorado tours this year. This one was up in Rocky Mountain National Park.

Shifting gears to Colombia, we ran two tours this summer and scouted another. Here part of our group from the Western Andes and the Choco work the cloud forest in search of Gold-ringed Tanagers, Empress Brilliants, and other special birds.

The cartoon character that is the Toucan Barbet is a member of a family with just two species. This one, and the Prong-billed Barbet of Costa Rica/Panama comprise Semnornithidae. Both species are highly social. Prong-billed roosts communally, with sometimes over a dozen birds in a cavity. Both are monogamous breeders, but the Toucan Barbet  has helpers that assist the nest pair in raising the young. It is found only in Colombia and Ecuador. The impressive dueting “french ambulance” song can be heard, where pairs are territorial, and the species nests regularly along the road through Farallones National Park at Dona Dora’s El Descanso. The birding is fabulous there, and the empanadas are even better.

A common and widespread bird, the Tropical Parula ranges from Texas all the way south to central Chile and Argentina. But it is always a pleasure to see and a crowd-pleaser when it poses like this, as this one did just outside our hotel in the Western Andes. At the northern end of their range, this species hybridizes fairly regularly with Northern Parula, confounding their identification at times.

El Niño and its associated weather this year made some birds a bit more challenging at times. We had to wait a while on these Black-billed Mountain-Toucans, but finally they showed and showed well. These were photographed by Casey Davidson, a Hillstar friend on the tour up to the High Andes of the Cordillera Central. 

Another big score on our Central Andes tour (High Times in the Cordillera Central) was this Ocellated Tapaculo, photographed by Casey Davidson. This is a bird heard often, but seeing it and seeing it well, much less photographing it, is a rare thing indeed.

One of the most handsome denizens of the Colombia cloud forest is the Black-collared Jay. This one from our High Times tour came into a feeding station along with another one and put on a heckuva show. One of the most stunning birds of the High Andes, found from 6000-10000 feet  in Colombia, Venezuela and just into Ecuador, this species remains still rather poorly known. Photo by George Armistead.

One of the trickiest, most interesting and taxonomically vexed species in the Americas (the world?), is the Sapayoa. A bird of the Chocó region, found just in Panama, Colombia and Ecuador, this species is currently placed within its own family, Sapayoidae. The scientific name is Sapayoa aenigma, and the species name ‘aenigma’ is indeed appropriate as ornithologists have long debated its placement among, and relationship with other birds. All agree, however, that it is an oddball, and this makes it a big target for birders who manage to access its range, which is itself a bit of a challenge. This individual was a member of a family of 4 we saw, and a very lucky (and hard-earned) find on our Western Andes & Chocó trip. Photo by George Armistead.

One of the most sought after endemics in Colombia is the Chestnut-bellied Flowerpiercer. This one photographed by Hillstar friend Rich Kuehn on the Western Andes/Chocó tour this year, was seen well after our 2nd attempt which involved a couple very early mornings. Known only from a few scattered sites along the Western Andes, this bird was thought extinct for a time, with no detections between 1965-2003. Today is found with some regularity but still requires some luck to see.

Forever a tricky bird, reported far more often than actually seen, and rarely photographed, this Pale-footed Swallow photographed by Martin Dellwo, was a great score on our High Times tour. We found a pair nesting by a bridge up in the high Andes, and also managed to see a flock of the critically endangered Indigo-winged (Fuertes’s) Parrots there too.

The Indigo-capped Hummingbird is endemic to Colombia. This one was seen and photographed on a recent scouting expedition by George Armistead to the Huila Department where we are planning a tour in 2024. 

Hooded Antpitta is a mythical bird, but recently a family that runs a small ecolodge in southern Colombia has protected some land and has begun feeding this species. Traditionally birders would search for this bird at Otun-Quimbaya, where it is often heard but seldom-seen. Now we have a great location to seek this bird and also other specials like the Dusky-headed Brush-Finch, Schwartz's Antthrush, and more. We hope to run this new tour in late 2024, and will seek these specials, and also 6-7 species of monkeys, including perhaps the smallest in the world, the Pygmy Marmoset. Photo by George Armistead.

Hillstar Pelagic leader Jonathan Irons captured this image on a recent Hillstar pelagic out of Lewes, DE into Maryland waters. This was one of three we had on the day. Also this day we had Bridled Tern, Long-tailed Jaeger, 20+ Black-capped Petrels, as well as Striped Dolphins, Sperm Whale and more.

THANKS TO ALL WHO JOINED US FOR THESE ADVENTURES! 

HOPE TO SEE YOU AGAIN SOON.