November 17, 2022

It’s a cold, sunny morning in the parking lot of Missoula’s Greenough Park. There are eight of us gathered here, carrying binoculars or magnifying glasses. We’re here for the Montana Natural History Center’s monthly naturalist saunter. Our goals for the morning are simple: be curious, observe, and get to know some of the stories of this place.

It snowed lightly last night. Now the thermometer at the airport reads 23°F, but it’s probably colder here, in the narrow valley of Rattlesnake Creek. 

I was in a hurry this morning, and now I’m mentally kicking myself for arriving so unprepared. I ran out of time to put my boots on. Instead I’m wearing a pair of worn-out hiking shoes and just two light coats. The only camera I have with me is my phone. My gloves are lightweight and slightly damp from the day before. But if a song sparrow can survive a whole winter out here with nothing but its feathers, I can probably be out here underprepared for an hour or two.

Naturalist Ser Anderson is leading this morning’s saunter. It’s is an opportunity for us all to get to know the winter landscape better. Whenever we’re out in nature, we all bring different perspectives and notice different things. 

“It makes this a really valuable experience to gather together,” Ser says.

Dippers and chickadees

It doesn’t take long to see this in action. By the time we’ve been walking for a minute, we’re already learning from each other about the creatures of this urban park. We stop at the footbridge over Rattlesnake Creek, where Ser has seen a pair of American dippers nesting for several years. Ser scans upstream and down, looking for a well-camouflaged, stream-dwelling gray bird with a buzzy call. But the dippers seem to be in another section of the stream today. Ser tells us that they see dippers here year-round. If Rattlesnake Creek freezes during a cold spell, these cold-hardy stream-dwellers will move downstream to the Clark Fork River. Otherwise, they seem to prefer foraging in the smaller streams, such as Rattlesnake Creek. 

Nate Johnson notices a narrow line of tracks across a snow-covered island in the creek. Could these be dipper tracks? It’s a thin trail through the snow, and the prints seem to alternate with each other. The trail is much too narrow for a mink or a muskrat, and the pattern doesn’t look right for a deer mouse or a vole. We can’t be sure, but an American dipper seems like a good guess.

While we’ve been scanning the creek for the elusive dippers, a mixed flock of black-capped chickadees and pygmy nuthatches has been keeping us company, flitting around the trunk of a large cottonwood near the creek. It’s another mixed-species winter flock, something we can expect to see frequently through the rest of the winter. Besides chickadees, nuthatches, kinglets, and woodpeckers, Ser mentions that they sometimes see jays joining these mixed-species groups.

Birds and plants in the cold

The wind is blowing plumes of snow off of the crest of Mount Jumbo above us. In spite of the sun, it’s cold. My toes are starting to complain. The rest of my body is asking me why I didn’t put another coat on this morning. I’m nowhere near the slippery slope towards hypothermia yet, but the morning would have been much more comfortable if I had planned ahead a bit more.

The cheerful calls of the chickadees seem to mock my discomfort. If they’re cold, they aren’t telling me. And even more amazing are the dippers. They plunge and swim through the ice-cold waters of the stream throughout the winter. For the dippers, this penguin plunge is their buffet: caddisflies, mayflies, other aquatic invertebrates, and perhaps even small fish are their year-round foods.

We stop to look at a patch of common snowberries (Symphoricarpos albus) growing next to a young grove of Norway maples (Acer platanoides). This unusual mixture is part of what makes Greenough Park interesting, Ser tells us. 

“It’s a fascinating combination of native species and non-native species,” they say.

Native plants like snowberry, yarrow, and cottonwood mix with garden escapes like Norway maple and European mountain-ash (Sorbus aucuparia). It’s a reflection of how much we’ve changed the landscape, colonizing it with houses, European plants, and pavement. But it also shows us how resilient native plants can be. A half-wild park like Greenough can be a refuge for biodiversity. It’s not pristine – but compared to a lawn or a parking lot, there’s a lot of habitat here.

Snowberries and hawthorns in Greenough Park

Fruits still hang from the snowberries in luminous white clusters. What eats snowberry fruits?

“Not much until they’re desperate,” Ser tells us. They’ve seen pine grosbeaks eating these fruits in January, when there’s not much else to eat. Indeed, this seems to be one of the biggest advantages of snowberry fruits. They may be mealy and mildly toxic to humans – and apparently they’re not especially tasty to birds – but they stay around throughout the cold season. Unlike the fall fruits, like elderberries and chokecherries, snowberries are still here when the cold gets bitter and any calories are important, whether they’re especially tasty or not.

Fall and winter fruits continue to accompany us on our meander through Greenough Park. We stop to look at a snow-capped nest in a hawthorn (Crataegus sp.). It’s conspicuous now that the leaves have died back. A bulky cup woven of grasses, it’s perched high in the hawthorn, close to the main stem. It’s the size of a large orange, almost directly over the busy pedestrian trail. Winter nest identification is a difficult skill, and no one in our group is very experienced with it. But based on the size, construction, and location, we suspect that this nest belonged to a pair of American robins.

The hawthorns in the park seem to have lost their fruits already. Did the birds eat them this fall, or was this just a bad year for hawthorn fruit set? Ser reminds us that, besides fruits, hawthorns offer a variety of other advantages to wildlife. Black-billed magpies commonly build their bulky stick nests among these thorny branches, where they’re well-protected from predators. And northern shrikes may impale their prey – mostly mice and voles – on the thorns.

Red-osier dogwoods and Rocky Mountain maples

Just a few yards from the hawthorn, we take a look at a red-osier dogwood (Cornus sericea), its deep red branches standing out against the snow. Its small, bitter white fruits are gone already. But earlier in the fall, Ser often sees pileated woodpeckers eating them. It’s a comical sight. The bulky, red and black woodpeckers can’t perch upright on the slender dogwood branches, so they tip upside down as they snatch the juicy fruits. And the pileated woodpeckers aren’t alone. Around Helena, I’ve seen white-crowned sparrows, American robins, and black-capped chickadees stocking up on red-osier dogwood fruits during fall migration.

But that season is past now. Half a foot of snow covers the ground, and the dogwood branches are bare. But even in the winter, we can learn to recognize these bushes by the personalities of their branches and buds. Ser points out that the winter red-osier dogwoods can resemble another of our native shrubs, Rocky Mountain maple (Acer glabrum). Both have branches that depart from the stem in opposite pairs, and both can have beautiful, reddish twigs.

So how can we tell these two apart? The buds provide one secret. Red-osier dogwood buds are elongate. Ser describes them like a pair of tiny prayer hands. Rocky Mountain maple buds, on the other hand, are rounder and fatter, protected by more bud scales.

Getting to know the bedrock

We slow down again as we pass by an exposed rock outcrop, jutting out towards the trail. Marilyn and Don Cook admire the rocks and marvel at how they came to be here. 

“My mind stops functioning past a few thousand years,” Ser says. It’s a similar experience for me: the immensity of geologic time is impossible for me to truly comprehend. But even though none of us are geologists, and our understanding is limited, it’s worthwhile to take a look at this outcrop. We notice that the rocks are arranged in rusty orange strata that dip towards the south. 

Later, I look at a geologic map and learn that this outcrop belongs to the Snowslip Formation, a layer of sediments laid down over a thousand million years ago. Tipping rock layers like these are a common sight in the Rocky Mountains. Originally, these rocks were deposited in level layers, the sediments carried off of the eroding mountains. But over time, immense and slow pressures tipped them, angling them southwards, as regional forces faulted and folded the bedrock up into new mountains.

But even without the geologic map – and without the ability to imagine a billion years – we can tell that these rocks are offering a unique habitat for creatures in the present. The south and east faces of this outcrop are bare rock, baked every day by the sun and scoured by rain and gravity. But where the rocks extend northwards in an overhang, where the water drips slowly and the sun doesn’t shine, a miniature garden of mosses and lichens are growing. In the early spring, perhaps the American dippers will venture here, gathering these mosses to build their sheltered nests under the footbridges that cross the creek.

Greenough Park’s waxwings

A soft, high-pitched chorus in the cottonwoods draws our attention away from the rock face. It’s a flock of cedar waxwings, their pale yellow bellies glowing in the morning sun. Ser spots a couple of Bohemian waxwings with them. Once in a while, we can hear the musical trills of the Bohemian waxwings mixing with the softer lisps of the cedars. It’s a different sort of mixed-species winter flock than the chickadees and the nuthatches: these birds are focused on fruits.

Cedar waxwings nest here in the summer, and some of them remain around Missoula through the cold season. They group up in the winter and shift their diet, from mostly insects to almost entirely fruits. The Bohemian waxwings, the larger, grayer cousins of the cedar waxwings, are strictly winter visitors to Montana. They nest in the boreal forest, moving south as the weather gets cold. Like the cedars, now they’re very focused on fruits.

So what are the waxwings doing in the top of this cottonwood, perching among its bare, fruitless branches? We notice a pattern of movement: a few at a time, the waxwings are gliding down from the cottonwood into the undergrowth. At the same time, others are flying back up to this conspicuous perch. Sure enough, as they land again, we can see that the waxwings are carrying bright orange fruits in their beaks. They’re feeding on the European mountain-ashes – one of those garden escapes that is common in Greenough Park. And if the waxwings are any judge, it seems that the mountain-ash fruits are tastier than the snowberries. Presumably, this flock is digesting their meal high up in the cottonwood so that they can watch for sharp-shinned hawks, merlins, and other predators. 

Elderberries and nightshades

Fruits and birds continue to accompany us as we wander through the park. We stop to look at the elderberries (Sambucus cerulea). The transition from fall to winter happened so fast this year that we can still find clusters of their powdery-blue fruits, drooping in the cold. Normally, the birds clean up the elderberries before winter arrives.

We pay attention to the hollow, pithy elderberry stems. They break off easily, giving these shrubs a rather disheveled appearance. But though they may not look very tidy, the elderberry stems are important. While many of our native bees nest in the ground, an important assortment spend most of their lives in twigs just like these. For example, bees in the genus Ceratina may overwinter in elderberry stems, hidden from sight, waiting quietly for spring to arrive.

We can still hear the waxwings trilling and lisping as they feed on the nearby mountain-ash fruits. A black-capped chickadee flits past us, probing busily for insects and spiders among the shriveled brown alder leaves that still hang from the branches. A song sparrow gives its chimp call from the thicket near us.

A slender, woody vine droops with shiny clusters of juicy red fruits near the trail. What is this? It’s bittersweet nightshade (Solanum dulcamara), a relative of tomatoes. Native to Europe and parts of Asia and northern Africa, it’s mildly toxic to humans. From what we’re seeing today, the birds don’t seem very interested in it, either. But as we’ve already seen, the birds’ interest in different fruits can change greatly through the season. Near Helena, I’ve seen white-crowned sparrows eating nightshade berries in the fall. And Ser thinks they remember seeing song sparrows eating these fruits, as well.

Hints of mammals

Snowberries, mountain-ashes, red-osier dogwoods, nightshades – could there possibly be more types of fruit in Greenough Park? Then we pass by a small apple tree hanging over the trail. Yes, that’s right – a domestic apple in this semi-wild park. How did it get here? Did a bird plant it? A bear? A person? 

In any case, no fruits are left on it now. Some branches are broken out of the top, and we can see a series of deep scratches gouged in the smooth bark. 

We debate who the culprit might be. Could it be a raccoon? But we agree that the accumulation of signs – fruits gone, branches broken, and heavy claw marks – seems to point towards a bear.

The claw marks in the tree are another sign that far more is happening in this park than we’re likely to see in one morning. In fact, it’s likely that each day we’re here will bring us different stories.

Alysha Goheen lives near Greenough Park and comes here almost daily. Recently, she tells us, she was excited to see a pair of raccoons traveling along Rattlesnake Creek during the daylight. She’s seen raccoons here before – including, on one memorable night, a female with eight kits – but to see them during the day is something unusual.

“It’s really nice to be able to come out here daily throughout the season,” Alysha tells me.

Learning the stories of Greenough park

Today, we’ve seen neither raccoons nor their tracks. It seems that they’ve stayed denned up since last night’s fresh snowfall. Alysha’s story of the raccoon is yet another illustration of the benefits of a naturalist saunter like this. All of us have developed a more thorough connection with this park today because of each other’s perspectives and stories. From Alysha, we’ve learned of the neighborhood raccoons and their habits. Ser has brought us the stories of the American dippers and a thorough appreciation for the park’s diversity of fruiting shrubs and the creatures they support. Marilyn and Don have reminded us to wonder at the unfathomable, billion-year-old stories of the rocks we stand on. And Nate has shown us what may well be dipper tracks along the stream.

Even on a cold, wintry morning, the stories we can find when we saunter outside are endless. Next time, I’ll make sure to dress a bit more warmly. But although my fingers and toes are slightly stiff, I wouldn’t have wanted to miss this morning. Today I’ve gotten to connect a little bit more with the place where I’m living. I’ve made some new friends and gotten to see their passion and curiosity as, together, we celebrate the beginning of winter in Missoula. Next month, I hope to be back. What stories will we encounter in December? Maybe I’ll see you there.

Further reading

Lonn, J.D., McDonald, C., Sears, J.W., & Smith, L.N. (2010). Geologic map of the Missoula East 30′ x 60′ quadrangle, western Montana. Montana Bureau of Mines and Geology Open-File Report 593, 2 sheets, scale 1:100,000. Retrieved from https://mbmg.mtech.edu/mbmgcat/public/ListCitation.asp?pub_id=31350&

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Fall has come gently to the Helena Valley this year. Temperatures have floated well above average. Killing frosts and early snowstorms have been delayed. Nevertheless, fall bird migration has seemed to fly past. The flood of warblers has passed through and the golden cottonwood trees have become quiet. But although fall can be a bittersweet season, with so many goodbyes as the summer birds leave Montana, the frigid months ahead are far from sterile. Here are a few of the bird stories to watch for in the months ahead:

Golden eagle migration

Sometime in early to mid-October, migrating golden eagles stream southward from Canada. They fly past silently. Few of us notice them passing. But for anyone who looks, it’s a spectacular sight. Along with many other raptors, large numbers of golden eagles funnel along the mountain ridges. Here, steady westerly winds act like an elevator, keeping these soaring birds aloft with a minimum of flapping. In mid-October, a mind-boggling 300+ golden eagles can glide past Helena’s mountain ridges in a single day, streaming rapidly southwards over the wind-blown subalpine firs.

Golden eagles over the valley

On some of these mid-October days, it’s possible to see this flow of migrating eagles from the valley bottom, too. October 16, 2017 was one of those days. I was out at Sevenmile Creek, doing a bird survey among the stark gray stems of the now-leafless chokecherries. As the morning warmed up, I spotted a dark speck circling in the blue sky over the rocky bulk of the Scratchgravel Hills. Soon there was a second one: two massive golden eagles high above, circling on thermals of rising air fueled by the mellowing warmth of the autumn sun. The eagles left their thermals and glided southwest overhead, towards the Boulder Mountains and the invisible spines of the mountain ridges extending south beyond them. 

Through that day of valley birding, I counted 11 golden eagles as they passed by, riding thermals and streaming south. It was an impressive spectacle in itself – and one that I could easily have missed, had I not been scanning the skies for tiny specks thousands of feet above me. But it was also part of something larger, a flood of raptors pouring south out of Canada. On that same day, observers at Duck Creek Pass on top of the nearby Big Belt Mountains counted an astounding 394 raptors gliding past their viewing station.

Snow geese and tundra swans

As the weather turns towards freezing and the first storms of winter blanket the ground with white, listen for a shrill barking music in the air over Helena. It’s the snow geese, passing overhead in uneven vees. With them, listen for the plaintive calls of the tundra swans and the trumpeter swans with their deep-throated barks. 

The passage of the geese and swans may not last long, but it’s incredible to behold. And when it comes to swans and snow geese, October 27, 2019 is a day that remains vividly in my memory. It was a morning that began with heavy frost. The ground was still covered with a thin layer of snow from a storm two days before, and the forecast called for temperatures falling to 0°F the following week. A handful of Last Chance Audubon Society volunteers and I had special permission to do yet another bird survey at Prickly Pear Land Trust’s Sevenmile Creek restoration site. Earlier in the month, we had watched golden eagles soaring through this airspace over the Scratchgravel Hills. Now, in their place, we were spotting snow geese and swans. A lot of snow geese and swans. 

Heading south

The swans came first, traversing the sky in small, vocal flocks. Often we saw our two species mixed together, a handful of the larger trumpeter swans leading a larger echelon of tundras. 

Next came the snow geese. They were flying higher than the swans, and in larger groups. Often we would glimpse a flock of them impossibly high overhead, their brilliant white bodies contrasting with their black wingtips, and then watch them disappear above the scattered stratus clouds that hung over the valley.

It was the sort of day when the birds kept coming, fast, and it took all five of us working together to count them. Our ears were tuned for the music of swans and high-flying geese. We scanned the northern sky, snapped photos as the flocks streamed past, and tried to count every single bird. And from our single site at the edge of the Helena Valley, when we tallied up the numbers, it was clear that the waterfowl were on the move. 322 trumpeter swans. 1,686 tundra swans. 1,105 snow geese. All of them flying powerfully south, navigating along the rocky backbone of Montana.

American tree sparrows

As winter settles in and the landscape relaxes into slow dormancy, American tree sparrows appear in the Helena Valley. The first tree sparrows of the fall generally arrive in October, flying south by night from their summer nesting places in the willows and spruces near the Arctic treeline. Small flocks stay with us throughout the winter, frequenting weedy, brushy places with a mix of shelter and seeds.

Watch for American tree sparrow flocks around patches of orach (Atriplex heterosperma), giant-seed goosefoot (Chenopodium simplex), pit-seed goosefoot (Chenopodium berlandieri), and kochia (Kochia scoparia). (Check out this video for some more information on our winter tree sparrows.) These dry, tan patches of weedy annuals are loaded with seeds. It’s common to first notice the tree sparrows by their calls, a sharp tip and a slightly less-common, warbled switlit. If you hear these calls, watch the bushes and weeds closely. There’s a good chance that there are a few dozen tree sparrows within, quietly stocking up on food to make it through the harsh cold snaps ahead.

And if you’re patient, you’ll be able to spot one of these gorgeous birds alighting in the tops of the goosefoot. Look for the neat black dot in the middle of the wintry gray breast. Notice how the bill is half-gray and half-yellow. And admire the sharp chestnut markings on the head before the tree sparrow flies, returning to seed-feeding in the cover of the dead annuals.

Rough-legged hawks

As the golden eagles of October glide silently past Helena, they bring with them another visitor from the far north. Rough-legged hawks spend their summers in the arctic. Montana is their idea of Arizona: a “mild” place to spend the winter. And as long as the snow doesn’t get too deep or too crusty, dozens of them can be found in the Helena Valley through the cold months. Rough-legged hawks are crisply patterned hunters. They’re the colors of winter: black shoulder patches like the long, cold nights and brilliant white flight feathers like the glare of the sun on the snow. They perch on fence posts, power poles, and in the very tops of trees and shrubs, scanning the snow that covers the valley. On a windy day, they’ll hover over the quiescent grasses, scanning the fields for mice and voles. 

Bohemian waxwings and their predators

As we reach November and the possibility of winter storms grows higher, watch for the arrival of these sleek, black-masked fruit-eaters. The fall and winter movements of Bohemian waxwings are notoriously variable from year to year, depending on where fruit can be found. In certain rare “irruption” years, massive numbers have appeared as far south as New Mexico.

Around Helena, bohemian waxwings are regular winter visitors. But here, too, numbers can be highly variable. In 2005, observers on the Last Chance Audubon Christmas Bird Count (CBC) reported over 16,000 bohemian waxwings around Helena. But in 2018, CBC observers only counted 20. 

Waxwings and fruits

In certain years, I’ve watched flocks of over 1,500 bohemian waxwings in the midst of Helena, feeding on winter fruits in peoples’ yards. Which fruits do they eat? Around Helena, the primary attractions seem to be Rocky Mountain junipers (Juniperus scopulorum), European mountain-ashes (Sorbus aucuparia), Russian-olives (Elaeagnus angustifolia), and crab apples (Malus sylvestris). The presence of cities on the Montana landscape has changed the winter fruit scene substantially. Of these four shrubs, only junipers are native. European mountain-ashes, Russian-olives, and crab apples are all widely planted ornamentals. Russian-olive has also become very widely naturalized in Montana, where it can pose threats to native plant communities.

Small flocks of bohemian waxwings can be incredibly tame, allowing us to get a close look at their chestnut butts, their yellow-tipped tails, and the waxy red spots in their wings. But large flocks are incredibly nervous, ready to fly at the drop of a pin. Why? All of these fruit-eaters attract predators. Around Helena in the winter, it’s common to see a merlin or a sharp-shinned hawk sneaking up on a waxwing flock, searching for a feathery meal.

Stories of our winter birds

As winter inches closer, it’s a time of slowing down. The days grow shorter. The leaves glow brilliantly for an instant, then drift to the ground. Our summer birds have left, our plants have shifted to dormancy, and our wood piles are ready for the cold. But there’s beauty to be found in the changing – and the quiet of winter isn’t as quiet as you might think. So as our hemisphere turns away from the sun, keep your eyes open for the feathered harbingers of the season. Watch for golden eagles, snow geese, and swans passing high overhead. Get to know our winter birds and the patterns of their lives. And as you do, consider that these rhythms of the landscape are stories people here have been noticing for many thousands of years.

What do these stories mean to you?

The post Stories to watch for: Helena’s fall and winter birds appeared first on Wild With Nature.

October 5, 2022

An orange-crowned warbler and two drab gray yellow-rumped warblers are hunting insects in a chokecherry this morning as its leaves drop softly, one by one, swirling to the moist ground in orange pirouettes. Helena, Montana’s Nature Park is busy with birds this morning, even though in general fall songbird migration is beginning to dwindle. Robins are everywhere, calling energetically as they land in the European mountain-ashes (Sorbus aucuparia) and feed on the bitter orange fruits. A few spotted towhees mew from the chokecherry thickets. A downy woodpecker whinnies occasionally. A large mule deer buck, unafraid here in the safety of the city limits, is thrashing an aspen with his polished antlers.

A slender, medium-sized bird bobs past us on rhythmic wingbeats. A northern flicker, we wonder? No – it’s a Clark’s nutcracker, sleek and gray with narrow white patches in its dark wings. I’m surprised to see this nutcracker – a bird closely associated with our pine forests – in the deciduous habitat of this park. A Clark’s nutcracker in the “wrong” habitat: I love stories like these. Unusual sightings like this remind me to expect the unexpected. Clark’s nutcrackers are birds of pine forests, yes – but like all birds, they move from one patch to the next. Finding a nutcracker at Nature Park is like finding me at Walmart. It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen. 

“So much stuff will just pass through here for a split second,” comments Sarah Kamis, my birding buddy this morning. She tells me about a time several years ago when she spotted a red crossbill – another seed-feeding specialist of the conifer forest – here in Nature Park. 

Birding in the heart of Helena

For Sarah and many other local birders, Nature Park is a special place for birds. These folks have gotten to know this place well over the course of the seasons – and they’ve turned up some amazing stories. Over the years, they’ve documented 18 species of warblers at Nature Park. This is a phenomenal diversity for anywhere in the Helena area – and particularly notable here, in the heart of the city. 

Today, we seem to be at the tail end of the fall white-crowned sparrow migration. Just a couple of chubby, brown-capped immatures are still hiding in the bushes. It’s another reflection of how dynamic migration is: a week and a half ago, Sarah and I found dozens of white-crowned sparrows here, feeding on seeds along the paved trail that runs through the park. Except for the white-crowned sparrows, that day was rather quiet, a lull between waves of southbound songbirds.

An impromptu gathering

September 24, 2022

But even when the birds are quiet, Nature Park is also a great place for impromptu community birding events. And so it was that, on that quiet morning, Sarah and I ran across our birding friends Sharon Dewart-Hansen and Bob Martinka. The slow morning of birding became a morning of storytelling. 

The conversation immediately turned to the impressive diversity of birds that birders have found here over the years. It all started in 2019, when Sarah spotted a rare black-throated gray warbler here, flitting through the bushes with some chickadees. Black-throated gray warblers typically spend the summers south of us, in dry oak and juniper patches in the Great Basin. But in August 2019, the out-of-place bird stayed around for over two weeks. Many local birders got to see it. And from then on, Nature Park was “on the map” for Helena birders.

Since then, Helena’s birders have gotten to know this park very well. When Sarah found the black-throated gray warbler, the bird list for Nature Park stood at just 85 species. Three years later, with all of the attention from local birders, the list is up to a whopping 147 species. It’s an incredible diversity – especially considering that Nature Park is in the middle of the city, and it lacks the extensive wetland habitats that would otherwise attract many more species of ducks and marsh birds.

Changes through the seasons

This morning, Bob had arrived at the park earlier than the rest of us, so he gave us his morning bird report and then took his leave. Bob’s observations confirmed our hunch – it was a slow day for fall migrants. He had seen a handful of Wilson’s warblers, Lincoln’s sparrows, and ruby-crowned kinglets. And, of course, there were the white-crowned sparrows. But otherwise, most of the migrant songbirds seemed to be elsewhere this morning.

As Sarah, Sharon, and I continued onwards through the quiet morning, they showed me a knothole in an aspen where a house wren had nested several years ago. Now the house wrens no longer nest here – they only stop at Nature Park during spring and fall migration. Why? Sharon wondered if increased numbers of pedestrians in the park have deterred the wrens from nesting.

Here at the end of September, the chokecherry bushes were already bare of fruits. Sharon told us that a horde of robins had come through the park several weeks before and devoured them all. Meanwhile, she pointed out, the magpies had returned to the park. For some reason, the magpies were nearly absent over the summer. But now they were back, perhaps taking advantage of the seeds that people feed the chipmunks.

Warblers, aphids, and crayfish

We passed by the spot along the creek where, in September 2020, Sharon and several other birders spotted two other rare birds: a chestnut-sided warbler and a black-and-white warbler. It’s a thicket of chokecherries and other shrubs along a gully: a patch of shrubs just like many others around Helena. But Sharon’s story reminded us that among these patches of shrubs, there’s often more than meets the eye.

Farther along, we stopped at an overlook where we could see the understory vegetation along the stream, a mixture of dock (Rumex sp.) and burdock (Arctium sp.). In past years, Sharon told us, there was more dock and less burdock here. She would often see various warblers among the glossy leaves, feeding on aphids. More recently, this patch has become much quieter. The dock population has shrunk, the burdock has increased, and the aphids have apparently disappeared. And so, it seems, have the birds.

We continued to where the creek, strewn with bits of trash and debris from the spring floods, crosses under the trail in a culvert. Might there be crayfish in the pool below the culvert?, Sarah wondered. We walked down the hill and checked the boulders around the pool. No crayfish here, it seemed. There are crayfish at the K-Mart Ponds (another local hotspot for birding), though, my companions told me. Sarah has seen them hiding in the water control structure at the outlet, and Sharon has watched red-necked grebes eating them.

Walking through Nature Park

Nature Park is a special place for birds. Every cottonwood, every aspen, and every chokecherry holds stories. Some days, during the height of migration, this place can be spectacular for birds. But even on quieter days, there’s always something to see, something to learn, and innumerable stories to remember. 

So this fall, I invite you to take a walk through Nature Park. Notice the seasons changing, and keep your eyes and ears open for the birds. And if you show up early in the morning, there’s a good chance you’ll find a friendly local birder with a wealth of stories about this place. I’ll see you there.

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