Bear Divide Birding – D8 & Global Big Day – 10 May 2025

By Miles

Bear Divide Birding – D8:

We started our day with a weekly Bear Divide birding and some backyard birding before heading out.

It’s our eighth day at Bear Divide this year, although we probably missed the peak, because it is a school day, the species variety and total bird counts were both super high today.

Bear Divide is a flat area in a valley within the Angeles National Forest, where a huge number of birds migrate through. For more information about Bear Divide, please see the previous blog post: “Bear Divide Birding – D1“, or visit the Bear Divide website: https://www.beardivide.org/.

Today, there were really a lot of Warblers! The banding station was catching a bunch of them, and was allowing us to actually see the special tail feathers of the Yellow Warbler. A bunch of Hermit Warblers are now finally going through, and I finally got some photos of these fast-flying birds. And there were so many Western Tanagers, Phainopeplas, Warbling Vireos. The Warbling Vireo was kind of being the Yellow-rumped Warbler of spring, but there were no longer any Yellow-rumped Warblers. There were also quite a few Yellow Warblers, but Western Kingbird, Lazuli Bunting, and Nashville Warbler numbers are decreasing.

The Hermit Warbler is a medium-small-sized passerine, a little bit smaller than a Yellow-rumped Warbler, with a typical warbler shape, but a more rounded head. It has black eyes, throat, beak, and nape. And except that the whole head is in a stunning, smooth, bright yellow color. Its breast and belly are white, and its legs are dark-colored. It has dark gray with white wing bars and a few black stripes on all of the other parts of its body. They are usually alone in coniferous forests in North America, feeding on insects and other bugs.

(Hermit Warbler flying past, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

The banding station was quite busy today; lots of birds were caught. They were putting bags of birds on the “waiting string” (a string they put in a shade, used to let birds wait when they have too many birds), and more and more birds were arriving back from the nets!

For more information on the Banding Station, please see the previous blog post: “Bear Divide Birding – D3“.

Today is also the eBird annual Global Big Day. We still need to complete three more checklists to meet the requirements for the birder of the month challenge: “five (5) or more eligible checklists on 10 May”!

More photos from Bear Divide:

(Banded Wilson’s Warbler, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Banded Nashville Warbler, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Yellow Warbler, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Banded Yellow Warbler, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Black-headed Grosbeak flying past, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Banded Black-headed Grosbeak, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Warbling Vireo flying past, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Lazuli Bunting, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Western Kingbird flying past, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Orange-crowned Warbler flying past, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Band-tailed Pigeon flying past, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Lark Sparrow, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

(Western Tanager flying past, May 10th, 2025, Photo by Miles)

Global Big Day:

The Global Big Day is an annual celebration of the birds around us. For more information, visit ebird.org’s news: “https://ebird.org/news/global-big-day-10-may-2025“

After Bear Divide, we drove to Placerita Canyon to bird as usual, but there were too many people there today, so we decided to head back home instead. After resting at home and doing some volunteering, we set off again to Gamble House’s hummingbird feeders. The Gamble House was very disappointing, with fewer birds than my backyard and a few hummingbirds, which is also fewer than my feeders. After that, we did a quick walk at Hahamongna Watershed and saw a bat, and checked the bird nests in my school in the sunset. Five checklists done!

Photo of the Bat (wonder what species it is):