Day Two of the DVOC trip to New Mexico – Today our primary target was the Sandia Crest area and specifically the rosy-finches that are found at the Sandia Crest House. Sandia Crest House is at 10,678 feet in elevation. From here, we would work our way south to Socorro to put us in position to bird Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. We began to congregate in the lobby of the motel for breakfast at 6:00 and we had the vans loaded and were on our way right on schedule. We had a dusting of snow on the vans to clear off the vans and the weather had indicated that an inch or two of fresh snow probably awaited us on the road to the peak. We started up the 14-mile drive to the peak and made a stop at a campground at the 2-mile mark.

We walked along a forest trail from this area to the next campground and then walked down the road to the vans. While we did have a few nice Townsend’s Solitaires and White-breasted Nuthatches it was, rather quiet and we did not find any of the promised woodpeckers in this area. We moved on up the mountain stopping where we could and where we were advised that there could be birds. We were particularly looking for Northern Pygmy-owl, Pine Grosbeaks and crossbills. We had not luck with any of these targets and the remnants of the weather front that had dropped the fresh snow on the peak was still blowing itself through. We watched at least two other cars get pulled out of the snow as we climbed higher and higher. As we went of the mountain the weather worsened with fog and blowing snow. It was rather scenic as all the trees were dusted with snow. We finally arrived at the Sandia Crest House a little after 10 and walked inside where from the comfort of the lodge and gift shop we had great views of all three feeding stations and most importantly rosy-finches.

A few days earlier the reports had been of a mixed flock of rosy-finches consisting of 20-25 Black Rosy-finches and a few each of Brown-capped and Grey-headed Rosy-finches. Today we were treated to a mixed flock of 25-30 Black; 20-25 Brown-capped and maybe half a dozen Grey-headed Rosy-finches. Not only could we watch these birds from the comfort of the lodge for over two hours but we also were able to watch and listen to a team of banders who were actively working this flock. In addition to the rosy-finches, we also had a Stellar’s Jay, small flock of Pine Siskins (maybe a dozen birds); Red-breasted Nuthatches; “Oregon” Juncos and a Hairy Woodpecker. We also were able to have lunch at the lodge before starting down the mountain. The road on the top half of the mountain was still somewhat snow covered as the blow was still making headway but the lower half of the road was clear. Another stop at the campgrounds found many people enjoying the beautiful day and not more birds but we did have two Abert’s Squirrels.

Our route from Sandia Crest took us on Route 333 to Route 41 to Route 60 to Route 25 into Socorro. Route 333 is the old Route 66 and trivia about the stars of the old TV show soon were traveling the radio waves between the vans. It was not until much later that the name of Martin Milner was remembered. This route took us through agricultural fields and we were hoping for raptors and field birds. We had a few raptors that were discussed as we moved along since we had no shoulder to pull off on. Fortunately, the first perched raptor we had was where we had a road to pull of on. This turned out to be a juvenile Ferruginous Hawk. This hawk did not sit for long but gave us a wonderful look at this regal raptor in flight. We also had our first Loggerhead Shrike. We continued along Route 41 and had quiet a few more Ferruginous Hawks including a spectacular adult. We had tons of Western Meadowlarks and the occasional Kestrel. A stop for a dark phase Red-tail Hawk became even more productive as a small group of Eurasian Collared Doves, a male Northern Harrier, several 100 Horned Larks and a huge covey of Scaled Quail. We estimated 50 of these quail. We continued along Route 41 stopping for maybe a dozen Ferruginous Hawks. We stopped for another raptor that turned out to be a red-tail and had a small group of young Mountain Bluebirds. They provided a nice contrast in study for the group or Western Bluebirds seen earlier in the day. Here we also had a Sage Thrasher. We also had a pair of Chihuahua Ravens and a Great Horned Owl along Route 60 before we thought we would be making a beeline to the Econo Lodge in Socorro. However, shortly after crossing Rio Grande we came to a wet meadow that held a few hundred Sandhill Cranes and many waterfowl, which in the advanced twilight could not be identified but could certainly be appreciated from an “abundance” point of view. This was a sampling of what we would be seeing tomorrow at Bosque Del Apache. After re-sorting out our arrangements at the Econo Lodge we all dropped our bags in our rooms, met in the lobby to do our checklists before heading out for dinner.

Tomorrow the plan is to spend the day at Bosque beginning with the pre-dawn fly out and ending with the sunset fly in.