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It’s In Your Nature: Montana trip adds species to bird life list

Published July 12. 2025 09:04AM

Yes, I love finding something neat and interesting on any of my Times News walks or hikes, but seeing a new bird for the year makes it even better.

Finding a bird for the first time in three or four years is even more special and better news.

Well, traveling to a new state, in completely new and special habitats, had me excited in anticipation of seeing some birds for the first time ever and, thus, adding them to my birding life list.

I wasn’t too disappointed. My recent trip to Glacier National Park in Montana and some of the other National Forests nearby resulted in me observing six new species.

My life list for North American birds has now reached 424. I was able to photograph a few of those, while some others only offered fleeting glances and didn’t cooperate for any decent photos.

In my column this week I’m sharing a few pictures of some of the 55 bird species I did find. I had held out hope to find an elusive great gray owl, but I think I didn’t get to that “best” location for that to come to fruition.

Neither did I get to see the beautiful mountain bluebirds. They are higher elevation birds, but the tracts of lands that I explored didn’t have those higher elevation meadows like I found in nearby Wyoming. Much of where I traveled were mountainsides covered in fir, spruce and larch.

The Rocky Mountain area does have some beautiful birds. Some of the birds we see wintering in our area, or moving north through our region in spring, actually nest there (northern juncos, for example). I also had a little surprise finding American robins there as well.

Even more surprising, I photographed them at the elevation of more than 6,500 feet at Logan Pass. They sure are far-ranging and adaptable. I even observed some along the shoulders of some secondary roads, again, in the middle of the conifer covered mountains and ravines.

I hope you will enjoy seeing photos of some of the birds I got to see in real life. Remember, get out there. Our region doesn’t disappoint, either, with its wildlife sighting opportunities.

Test Your Outdoor Knowledge: Which of these local mammals climb trees, or can climb trees? A. porcupine; B. woodchuck; C. gray fox; D. none of these; E. all of these.

Last Week’s Trivia Answer: I had my last goshawk sighting about 30 years ago when it chased a small flock of wild turkeys (much to my surprise). They are rare in the northeastern U.S. and particularly in Pennsylvania, and now on its endangered species list.

Email Barry Reed at breed71@gmail.com

One of my possible life list finds was the white-tailed ptarmigan. Luckily, I was one of the first people hiking the Hidden Lake Trail atop the mountain at Logan Pass in Montana and “broke off” the trail, finding two. BARRY REED/SPECIAL TO THE TIMES NEWS
The white-tailed ptarmigans have already molted: This is their summer plumage. In winter they are all white except for their black bill and eyes.
The sun had melted a few patches of open ground at about 7,000 feet in elevation to reveal grasses, mosses and lichens. Feeding in those open areas were a few Sprague’s pipits (another “lifer”).
Not a “lifer,” but I was surprised to find a few robins feeding wherever some of the snowpack melted. I guess you can find them almost everywhere in the U.S.
As you descend down Going-to-the-Sun Road the lower elevations are covered with spruce, firs and larch trees. A number of ruby-crowned kinglets fed on insects and spiders among the branches. The red crest isn’t always visible, but this male obliged and showed off his crown.
In the conifer-covered hillsides I found and heard a number of Western tanagers. They are not the brilliant red of our local scarlet tanagers, but still quite beautiful.
When the rain and fog chased me from the mountain, I found a number of side streets in the valley to explore. In one pasture I found sandhill cranes. Here a rain-soaked crane stands near a grazing whitetail. Note the size comparison. A sandhill crane stands about 4 feet high. BARRY REED/SPECIAL TO THE TIMES NEWS
Moments later a young crane rose from the wet grass to join its mother.
The spruce forests do hold a few warbler species. A new bird for my life list was this Townsend’s warbler doing what warblers do: eating caterpillars and other small insects.
In the rainy weather I followed some back roads looking for tubular flowers and hoping to find one of the three hummingbird species present in the area. Two of them cooperated to let me find them. And, even better, to get some photos. This is a rufous hummingbird. What a beautiful bird.
Even in the rain the rufous hummingbird bird looks great showing off its characteristic back plumage.
The smallest hummingbird species in the U.S. is the calliope hummingbird. I found this one feeding on roadside flowers, where it would feed and return, apparently, to its favorite perch. Note the beautiful purple/red rays (feathers) it sports from its neck.
I had to show another view of this handsome yet tiny bird, which attains a “whopping” 2¾ inches in size.
Tags:
Barry Reed, Environment