Viva Las Vegas!!! Life Bird #555

I'm gonna give it everything I've got
Lady luck please let the dice stay hot
Let me shoot a seven with every shot
Viva Las Vegas, viva Las Vegas, viva Las Vegas
Viva, viva Las Vegas

OMG! Kittens Slot Machine. Needs a Gunther

I'm back from Las Vegas, Nevada. What a great vacation. Short, but well desired. There is something to be said about 106 degree dry heat, and the low of 79 degrees is perfect, especially at 6am PST. This was the third year in a row I've gotten to visit Vegas, and the third time I've meet up with Birdingpal.org guide John Taylor. He is a local guide and volunteer at the Henderson Birding Preserve. And that's exactly where we went on Tues Sept 2nd morning. In just four hours there, Whitney Mesa and Sunset Park produced 65 total species for the day/16 FOYs/1 LifeBird

daybreak and beautiful

Red-Neck Phalaropes

 We saw about 50 of the phalaropes, we hoped for a larger Wilson's phalarope in the group, but to no avail this time.

Gambel's Quail

 The official bird of the Gambill family, the Gambel's Quail. Not named after us, but we'll take it. A bird of the Desert Southwest, Gambel's Quail is common in much of the Southwest, particularly southern Arizona and New Mexico.

Roadrunner . . . beep beep @ Sunset Park

Mission, Texas homebase

      

Black-neck Stilt & American Avocet

Black Phoebe

Cinnamon Teal

Loggerhead Shrike

Townsend's Warbler

Also seen in Colorado in May

Yellow-Headed Blackbird--YHBB

Costa's Hummingbird-Male

Black-chinned Hummingbird

Life Bird time: So at the end of our 4 hours at Henderson, me and John decide to take one more loop around a pond to see if we can get any other birds. On the way back, I saw this large gray bird, on top of a small tree, in the wash between pond 7 and pond 4. It had prominent eye-ring and wingbars, back gray, belly white and constantly wags tail slowly downward. I said "it looks like a Gray Flycatcher" and John gets out and and confirms!!! A life bird for me, and a first Nevada bird for John. I didn't get a picture of it, as it flew farther away, but got a second look with my bins. Below is a stock photo from the internet.

Gray Flycatcher, Life Bird #555

Birding!! check out the bumper sticker

Nature Center at Henderson BP

New York New York Casino at 5am PST

Home Base in Vegas at 5am PST

This puts my #BIGYEAR2014 number at #324 for the year!!
#309 Gambel's Quail
#310 Greater Roadrunner
#311 Black-chinned Hmbrd
#312 Anna's Hmbrd
#313 Costa's Hmbrd
#314 Gray Flycatcher  ABA#555
#315 Black Phoebe--I'm Phoebed out!!
#316 Ash-throated Flycatcher
#317 Verdin
#318 Bewick's Wren
#319 Black-tailed Gnatcatcher
#320 Crissal Thrasher (heard)
#321 Orange-crowned warbler
#322 Abert's Towhee (heard)
#323 Yellow-headed blackbird
#324 Great-tailed Grackle 

Next Up:  a rare heron in Ohio?? I need that bird for the year!!