[Birdtalk] Tony Grove Woodpeckers

[Fish, Michael]

I went up to Tony Grove (about 30 miles up Logan Canyon) on Sunday and
spent about four hours hiking around and trying to find birds. I had my
three young kids with me so I couldn't do any hard core bird sneaking.
On the north end of the nature trail (boardwalk trail) that loops around
the lake, there were several Western Tanagers in the pines. They are
difficult to get close to (especially with kids), but with a 600mm lens
or > you could capture some nice photos. There was a nesting pair of
Hairy Woodpeckers, in an island of trees between the white pine trail
and the boardwalk nature trail. The nesting area is closer to the white
pine trail. The Woodpeckers are maybe 200 yards north of the Tony Grove
parking lot. They are coming and going frequently to the nest with food
for their babes. The Woodpeckers are making plenty of noise so they are
hard to miss. The male squawks or "keeks" at most passersby on the trail
- although few of them notice him. If you do stop to notice him, he and
the miss's will give you an earful of peeks and keeks. 

 

There were several other common birds around the lake, but I found a
jack-pot of woodpeckers down the road from the lake. As the road makes
the big bend through the aspen area 2-3 miles below Tony grove, there is
a road that takes off to the west (paved for first 100 feet and then
dirt - no problem for a car) and heads up to what I call the Bunch Grass
overlook. I'm not sure what the official name of the road is. Bunch
Grass is the name of the canyon area to the north of the overlook.
Anyway, the road heads west for maybe a quarter mile and then turns to
the north. Just a couple hundred yards after you start heading north you
will see several aspen trees on the east side of the road (downhill
side) with sap rings drilled or hammered around them from the
woodpeckers. The trees are only about 20-30 feet off the dirt road. I
turned my car off and sat and watched from the comfort of my car while
17 woodpeckers came to the trees within 20 minutes. The birds would jump
from tree to tree to lap up the sap and sometimes there would be two or
three Woodpeckers at the same time. Much to my dismay, I could only stay
a short while because I had to get back home. If anybody wants to see a
lot of Woodpeckers and get some good pictures, this would be a hot spot.
I saw a few Hairy Woodpeckers but mostly what I believe are Red Naped
Sapsuckers. I'm not real good with woodpecker identification, but there
were a lot of them in the area. The lighting is a bit challenging for
photos with diffused sunlight through the trees. I wished I could have
stayed longer to watch. I was in that location at about 4pm and the
birds were very active.

 

Also, If you want to see a House Wren, you can almost always spot one in
the snowmobile trailer parking loop just after you pull off the highway
to head up to Tony Grove Lake. There is an island of trees and shrubs in
the middle of the parking loop near the restrooms that almost always has
a house wren flitting about.

 

Mike Fish

 

P.S. Very few wild flowers were out at Tony Grove, give it another two
weeks. Also the day-use fee is now 5 dollars.

 

I have a few pictures posted at www.pbase.com/mfish 

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