Now that the new Idahobirds site is live I want to point out a feature I
think has tremendous potential for expansion. Kas Dumroese has made the
old Idaho Birder’s Guide available on the site. Thanks Kas. This was my
Bible when I started birding and I visited many of the sites it
includes. I found it indispensable when traveling to other parts of the
state. So if you aren’t familiar with it take a few minutes to look it over.

A Birder’s Guide To Idaho

The site also includes a section for the Idaho Birding Trail.
https://fishandgame.idaho.gov/ifwis/ibt/pub.aspx?id=guide
The sites don’t have as much detail as the Birder’s Guide and there is
some overlap but there many sites not covered in other resources.
Definitely worth a look.

That said I started birding Island Park Reservoir years ago and had to
figure out how to access the best locations, etc. Over the years people
would occasionally want to go out there and I finally decide to put a
map together. I fine tuned it and added it to the new web site.

Island Park Reservoir

It was kind of thrown together quickly so I invite you to look it over
and offer any suggestions for improvement. I feel it’s one of the most
overlooked hotspots in the state and has produced many rarities over the
years despite Lisa and I being about the only people who bird it, and
not nearly often enough at that. Hopefully this will generate a bit more
coverage. I have a couple more little spots in mind for a page of their
own and I’ll get to them as time permits.

With that in mind I will also invite you to think about your own local
patch and whether you think it would be beneficial for others to know
how and hen to bird there. If you’d like to put together a write up for
your favorite place(s) we can make a map and post a site description for
all to enjoy.

Another thing that would be useful is any significant changes to habitat
or access or newly discovered birding opportunities at locations already
covered by Birder’s Guide and Idaho Birding Trail. Examples off the top
of my head would include discovery of Camas NWR and Market Lake WMA as
amazing vagrant traps during migration. Fires burning off forest or
brush. Road closures. You get the idea. Rather than arrive and discover
you can’t get there or there are no trees it would be great if these
changes were mad available on Idahobirds. Obviously these could be very
brief descriptions of relevant changes so if you know of changes to any
of the locations please take a minute to document them for everyone’s
benefit. Any other suggestions are welcome.

Hope everyone is enjoying the site as much as I am. My thanks to all who
contributed (I’m not really one of them). I know it was a ton of work
and I appreciate the effort.

Cliff

—
Cliff and Lisa Weisse
Island Park, Idaho
cliffandlisa@octobersetters.com

Wendy — thanks again for a wonderful post. I feel like I am up there
with you. I just got back from a long weekend trip down to Castle Rocks
and City of Rocks parks. Best bird for me was a lifer Gray Flycatcher.
Also being part of documenting their first confirmed sighting of a
Common Yellowthroat

Scott Tuthill

Thanks very much Lisa, Cliff, Darren, Shirley, Charles & everyone else for working on this!!!

Jay

> On Jun 2, 2017, at 10:19 PM, Cliff and Lisa cliffandlisa@octobersetters.com [ible] wrote:
>
> Hi everyone,
>
> The new IdahoBirds.net web site is live. It takes a while for all the servers on the Internet to point to the right place, so some people might still get the old site. If that happens just wait. It will eventually switch for you.
> Here are a few things we want everyone to know.
>
> The photos you contributed are on the Species Latilong pages within the Distribution section. I was super impressed with how many people put their time into finding the images we needed, and also with the quality. We have a good group of bird photographers in Idaho! In some cases there were multiple great photos to choose from, and which ones got posted depended on things like better photo, taken in Idaho, interesting, or spreading it out among the photographers. Darren Clark has photos of more than half of the species, so we initially started there to get as many filled in as possible. That makes him a bit over-represented though:-) We don’t intend these to be static, and it would be nice to see them rotated. Lets leave them for a while to give people a chance to see all of them, and then we’ll gradually start rotating. I highly recommend clicking on the images to see larger versions. Some are simply the best any Idaho birder could find or documentary photos of rare birds in the state, but a lot of them a really good and worth taking a closer look at.
>
> We have plans to expand the site, especially in the Destinations area. Will post more on that later.
> Darren made new versions of the latilong maps. He is working with Shirley Sturts to get them updated and current with the records, but it will be a few weeks before that is complete. People can submit new latilong changes now, but it may be better to wait until Darren is done and he lets everyone know.
>
> IBLE posts to the new site. We have not been able to do that (so far) with Inland-NW but Charles Swift is working on it. In the mean time, emails that are sent to IBLE will post, so if you are a member of both you can cc to IBLE and it will appear on the web site.
> Please let me know if you see anything that doesn’t seem to work right- bad links, typos, missing records, etc. One minor thing you can ignore is the little caution sign by the url about the site not being completely secure on some pages. That’s coming from the BirdTrax gadget that shows eBird sightings. Not to worry- just don’t enter your credit card or anything:-)
> Lisa
> –
> Cliff and Lisa Weisse
> Island Park, Idaho
> cliffandlisa@octobersetters.com
>

Despite flooding along the Salmon River in Custer County, the breeding seasongoes on in the Challis area. The Canada Geese have goslings growing quickly beyond the cutefledgling stage. In the past couple of weeks, there have been Hooded and CommonMerganser chicks, as well as Mallard young. This week, we pulledoff the road at McNabbs Point to allow a speedy tailgater to pass and there wasa Killdeer with four tiny fledglings right at the edge of the rocks. NoisySpotted Sandpipers can be heard and seen everywhere along the river and creeks.Colorful Wilson’s Phalaropes are frequent sights.

 
The highlight this week was spotting a Sandhill Cranechick. Seeing cranes on their breeding grounds is a thrill after years of onlyseeing them in duller plumage on their winter grounds in Arizona and NewMexico. Seeing a rusty little chick in a green field dotted with colorful pink Dark-throatedShooting Star flowers was memorable.

 
Passerines are also busy getting busy. Robins and starlingsare making a dent in the local earthworm population trying to keep their hungrynestlings fed. It was quite satisfying to see a pair of Bullock’s Orioles repelthe attempts of a female Brown-headed Cowbird to sneak into a hanging nest.

 
We’re seeing more Eastern Kingbirds than Western Kingbirdsaround Challis, which strikes me as funny due to their names. The empids aresinging, making it a bit easier to figure them out. Western Wood-pewees areeither following me around or are very common as they are the first bird I hearwhen at each birding stop.

 
Singing males of multiple species create a wonderfulsoundscape. Warbling Vireos are singing up a storm, while the bright colors of singing Yellow Warblers, Western Tanagers, and Lazuli Buntings paint a lovely picture. Cedar Waxwings showed up this week, seeminglyeverywhere at once, making the trees look as if someone filled them withornaments.

 
The swallows are busy, too. The large Bank Swallow colony inChallis is an amazing sight as birds pour out of the nest holes all at once likean avian waterfall. Violet-green Swallows are circling around almost everycliff face while Cliff Swallows are busy with their mud nests under thebridges. The Tree Swallows chatter near their nests while keeping a watchfuleye out for bothersome starlings. Birding around ponds is a great way to spend sometime late in the day, watching up to six species of swallows tank up for thenight.

 
There are, of course, many other species around that I haven’tmentioned, such as whinnying Soras, drumming woodpeckers, and singing sparrows,but this post has gotten long enough already. I hope everyone else is enjoyingthe birds in their area as much as I am in the Challis region.

 
Wendy McCrady

Challis, ID

Hi everyone,

The new IdahoBirds.net web site is live. It takes a while for all the
servers on the Internet to point to the right place, so some people
might still get the old site. If that happens just wait. It will
eventually switch for you.

Here are a few things we want everyone to know.

The photos you contributed are on the Species Latilong pages within the
Distribution section. I was super impressed with how many people put
their time into finding the images we needed, and also with the quality.
We have a good group of bird photographers in Idaho! In some cases there
were multiple great photos to choose from, and which ones got posted
depended on things like better photo, taken in Idaho, interesting, or
spreading it out among the photographers. Darren Clark has photos of
more than half of the species, so we initially started there to get as
many filled in as possible. That makes him a bit over-represented
though:-) We don’t intend these to be static, and it would be nice to
see them rotated. Lets leave them for a while to give people a chance to
see all of them, and then we’ll gradually start rotating. I highly
recommend clicking on the images to see larger versions. Some are simply
the best any Idaho birder could find or documentary photos of rare birds
in the state, but a lot of them a really good and worth taking a closer
look at.

We have plans to expand the site, especially in the Destinations area.
Will post more on that later.

Darren made new versions of the latilong maps. He is working with
Shirley Sturts to get them updated and current with the records, but it
will be a few weeks before that is complete. People can submit new
latilong changes now, but it may be better to wait until Darren is done
and he lets everyone know.

IBLE posts to the new site. We have not been able to do that (so far)
with Inland-NW but Charles Swift is working on it. In the mean time,
emails that are sent to IBLE will post, so if you are a member of both
you can cc to IBLE and it will appear on the web site.

Please let me know if you see anything that doesn’t seem to work right-
bad links, typos, missing records, etc. One minor thing you can ignore
is the little caution sign by the url about the site not being
completely secure on some pages. That’s coming from the BirdTrax gadget
that shows eBird sightings. Not to worry- just don’t enter your credit
card or anything:-)

Lisa

–
Cliff and Lisa Weisse
Island Park, Idaho
cliffandlisa@octobersetters.com

v.3

if you haven’t listened to Janis Joplin recently, pls treat yourself……….

many many birds therein

—– Original Message —–

From: “LARRY ARNOLD”
To: ible@yahoogroups.com
Cc: “leon stigen”
Sent: Thursday, June 1, 2017 4:01:12 PM
Subject: Re: little big day

v.2

—– Original Message —–

From: “LARRY ARNOLD”
To: ible@yahoogroups.com
Cc: “leon stigen”
Sent: Thursday, June 1, 2017 12:35:50 PM
Subject: little big day

Tom might say that Harry might say that we had a Good Day on The 3rd Rock. ;- ) ~~~~~

eh?

Missy and I like to focus on Idaho counties – one at a time – exploring scenery, weather, veg, birds, mammals, other salient creatures, just to hang out, doing our thing, et shazam, listing everything we see and hear……….

A few days ago we hit Elmore County and celebrated 131 sp of birds therein: http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S37149506

This is what we live for. =)

LA

—

v.2

—– Original Message —–

From: “LARRY ARNOLD”
To: ible@yahoogroups.com
Cc: “leon stigen”
Sent: Thursday, June 1, 2017 12:35:50 PM
Subject: little big day

Tom might say that Harry might say that we had a Good Day on The 3rd Rock. ;- ) ~~~~~

eh?

Missy and I like to focus on Idaho counties – one at a time – exploring scenery, weather, veg, birds, mammals, other salient creatures, just to hang out, doing our thing, et shazam, listing everything we see and hear……….

A few days ago we hit Elmore County and celebrated 131 sp of birds therein: http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S37149506

This is what we live for. =)

LA

—

Tom might say that Harry might say that we had a Good Day. ;-

Missy and I like to focus on Idaho counties – one at a time – exploring scenery, veg, birds, mammals, salient creatures all, just to hang out, doing our thing, et shazam, listing everything we see and hear……….

A few days ago we hit Elmore County and celebrated 131 sp of birds therein: http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S37149506

Birders, this is what we live for. =)

LA

—

There is currently a first year male White-winged Scoter (I don’t believe
an adult) on Island Park Reservoir. I am just east of the dam/spillway on
the south side. The red marker on the screenshot I attached is the bird and
the blue circle me!

Austin Young
Twin Falls, ID

—
Austin Young Pocatello/Twin Falls, ID austinyoung224@gmail.com

A Scissor-tailed Flycatcher was spotted and photographed on Saturday, the 27th, on Benson Road, about 16 miles south of Rockland on Highway 37. I went looking for it on Monday, May 29th, but only found Western Kingbirds.
Cheers,
Chuck Trost

Always forward, never straight…