Headed over to East Glacier on our way to Glasgow this morning, stopping to look for Clark’s Nutcracker that unfortunately only Brian saw. However, a large marshy area along the road was pretty phenomenal as it held maybe a dozen calling Sora’s and we saw a couple of them quite easily. In the early morning sunshine with distant snow-capped peaks the setting was stunning and add in a few breeding-plumaged Wilson’s Phalaropes as well, you could say it was an idyllic spot.
Next up was a long drive east for around 4 hours towards Glasgow, veering off into the wilderness we drove along a gravel road in the middle of nowhere to look for Mountain Plover. This was where things went decidedly off the rails as we had 2 flat tyres within 10 minutes, however despite this we well and truly nailed Mountain Plover amidst a vast open scenery of prairies and gently rolling hills.
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| There's a Mountain Plover out there..... |
We didn’t get too close as we suspected this was a female who had a nest somewhere so we scoped her at several hundred metres range, but the views were cracking through the scope. So what to do with 2 flats? Fortunately we were just 5 miles from a farmhouse and we limped in on a flat trye and asked for assistance. The help we received was amazing and truly heart-warming. The upshot was we had a lift to the small town of Malta and found some rooms in a motel where we spent the night, hoping that our car would be brought to us the following morning…... The motel turned out to be one of the best we stayed in and served cold beers and delicious food. Everyone was pretty upbeat despite our bad luck with the tyres and I’m truly thankful that I had such an understanding group. Fortunately, I could arrange to rebook our night in Glasgow so we could hit the famous Bentonite Road at a good time of day and cut out a night in Jamestown in a few days so we wouldn’t miss out on any of our key target species.
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