February 23 -- Birding With Norm Parrish In Mesquite, Nevada

6am saw me driving up the Moapa Valley road north through Overton and Logandale then heading north on Interstate 15. I was to meet Norm Parrish at the Wal-Mart in Mesquite, 30 miles north, at 7:30. The sunrise had some spectacular color; here's the view looking south towards the town of Logandale in the distance --

After having breakfast at a MacDonald's in Mesquite -- my usual oatmeal with raisins and apple bits, along with the 2 burrito meal -- I met Norm at Wal-Mart, and we headed over to a golf course that had ponds which he regularly scans for birds, along with the scrubby desert area running alongside it. A bit about Norm: he'll be turning 70, is from a small town in Alberta, Canada, and retired both from the military and teaching a class in industrial arts at a college there. Since retiring about 9 years ago his passion has been birds, and he's seen discovered a few rare ones when he started "snowbirding" in the Mesquite area since retirement -- Common Crane, a Eurasian species similar to out Sandhill Cranes, for instance, along with a Northern Parula near the city of St. George in Utah. We had first met at the Overton Wildlife Management Area when he saw me with my binoculars and 500mm lens and promised one another that we'd check out the local birds together (as two pairs of eyes can see more than one). During our walk along the edge of the golf course (we couldn't go on the golf course grounds due to "liability" issues, i.e., if we get beaned by a golf ball) we heard and saw Gambel's Quail --

And on the golf course ponds were the inevitable mass of Coots along with Ring-billed and Ruddy Ducks and a few other species, and later a small group of Canada Geese flew in. But the real catch, at least for me, was the Prairie Falcon we spotted on the way back, who was scanning the area from high atop a utility pole. He was watching us intently --

And once he decided we were too close for comfort, he took off, and I got his flight with the 7D/500f4 and 1.4xTC combo (I'd taken the BushHawk off, and was carrying it handheld) --

In these photos you can easily see what Norm calls the Prairie Falcon's "underarms",  the dark areas of the wings near the body. So now I was the proverbial "happy camper", having gotten good flight shots, and after walking back to our cars we drove back over to Wal-Mart to check out iPods for Norm as he wanted to get an iPod filled with bird calls like I have with my BirdJam iPod Nano. We then went to a restaurant in the Eureka Casino there in Mesquite and had a good lunch (always pleasant to have after a morning of birding and walking), talking about everything from Candian Prie Minister Stephen Harper to Canada's health care system (he likes it). After lunch I headed back to Overton and Discovery after making plans with Norm to go birding at the Overton wildlife area the next day (today). I relaxed, took a nap and did computer stuff for the rest of the day -- and that was it. A nice, relaxing, enjoyable day spent with good company -- I couldn't have asked for a better day...