Rare Veery In The Wasatch Mountains

Veery in the Wasatch Mountains – Nikon D500, f7.1, 1/800, ISO 500, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light

I might just start believing that September 1st is my lucky day after seeing, photographing and identifying a rare Veery in the Wasatch Mountains yesterday.

I was photographing birds in near a willow thicket and seep when I saw a flash of reddish cinnamon and a bird flew in and landed on a branch above the seep. I quickly moved my lens towards the bird, my brain said “thrush”, and I fired away after locking on. Then the bird flew off and I continued photographing the other birds that were nearby.

It wasn’t until I got home and looked at my photos of the “thrush” that I realized that I’d photographed a Veery, a thrush that is rare here in Utah. I was 99.9% sure of my ID.

Because of my limited experience with Veeries and the fact that I didn’t have any photos showing a clear view of the bird’s chest I contacted Mark Stackhouse, one of my go to people when I have difficulties with bird identification, bird tour guide and fellow bird photographer, and he agreed with my ID after seeing both of the photos I have shared here on this post.

Thanks for the assist Mark!

I’ve sent in the Veery sighting and photos to the Utah Bird Records Committee and if this sighting is accepted it will be the the 14th vetted record of a Veery in recent history (see below). I also posted the sighting and my images to eBird, the local Utah Rare Bird Alert Facebook page, and sent the info out on the Utah Bird email list. Ron Dudley also saw the bird but didn’t take photos of it and he wouldn’t have been able to identify it.

Apparently Veeries didn’t used to be rare in northern Utah though. In the 1800’s they were reported as “abundant”. Over time they became less and less common and now they are on the Utah Bird Records Committees Review List. See the history of Veery sightings below.

Veery

*10,11 Jul 1869 – lower Provo River, Utah Co., by Ridgway (reported as abundant)
*21 Jul 1927 – northeast of Wellsville, Cache Co., by Sanford (specimen taken)
*10 Apr 1929 – near Salina, Sevier Co., reported by Sanford (specimen taken).
*29 Jun 1933 – Provo River, Provo, Utah Co., by R. G. Bee (eggs in BYU collection)
*1 Jun 1934 – City Creek, Salt Lake Co., by A. D. Boyle (4 eggs in BYU collection)
*4 Jun 1934 – Provo, Utah Co., by D. E. Johnson (eggs in BYU collection)
*Jul 1935 – near Jensen, Uintah Co., (specimen in the Royal Ontario Museum)
*14 Jun 1951 – along Clear Creek, Raft River Mountains, Box Elder Co., by Behle and Selander (male specimen – possibly breeding)
*13 Jun 1964 – American Fork Canyon, Utah Co., by Kashin
*13, 14 Jan 1972 – Salt Lake City, Salt Lake Co., by Kashin (one egg found)
21 May 1983 – Ranch at Antelope Island, Davis Co., by Donald A. Hadley, John Belman, others (breeding adult) | Sight Record | Original Record |
30 Aug 2013 – Garr Ranch, Antelope Island Davis Co., by Ken Rosenberg, (adult, photos) | Sight Record |
11 Sep 2019 – Holladay, Salt Lake Co., by Kenny Frisch (one, Photos) | Sight Record |

*Sightings accepted by the Records Committee without reviewing a specific sight record. (These are mostly sightings before the records committee was organized)

Veery lifting off – Nikon D500, f7.1, 1/800, ISO 500, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light

This is a really crappy photo of the Veery lifting off but it helped to clinch the ID.

Now you may wonder why one sighting of a rare bird on September 1st in northern Utah would make me think that it is a “lucky day” for me. Well On September 1, 2008 I had another are “rare” thing happen to me. I was living in Florida at the time and that morning I was on the north Beach of Fort De Soto County Park photographing birds.

In the distance I saw a large flock of birds moving towards me and thought from the long distance views I could see of them on an especially hazy morning that they might be a flock of terns. As the birds got closer I realized that the birds weren’t terns at all.

They were all Swallow-tailed Kites. Swallow-tailed Kites aren’t rare in that area of Florida but what was unusual was that there were more than 70 of them. Flying above and around me. I couldn’t back up the zoom on my 80-400mm lens far enough to get a photo al them all. I remember whooping out loud when they flew past me. I’m sure my fellow beach-goers thought I had lost my mind. But it felt magical to me. It felt like those gorgeous swallow-tailed raptors gave me an “air” hug before they continued their fall migration south.

I ran towards my Jeep to drive up the road to find Jim Wilson who at the time was the park Supervisor and when I found him he told me that the kites reached the old fort and wheeled around it several times before they continued moving south.

I found out later that was the most Swallow-tailed Kites flying over the park at one time.

So yes, September 1st does feel like a lucky day for me.

Life is good. Stay safe.

Mia