Riparian Preserve at Water Ranch, Feb 7, 2025

Mary Ann and I went to the Riparian Preserve at Water Ranch (RPWR) in Gilbert on Friday, Feb 7, 2025. I noticed in the daily ‘Maricopa County Rare Bird Alert’ that there were some interesting warblers reported there: the Black-and-white Warbler, Wilson’s Warbler, Yellow Warbler, Black-throated Gray Warbler. Also the American Redstart and Northern Parula were reported. So we decided to check it out.

We spent most of our time on the ‘Warbler Way’ and ‘Clover Owl Trail’, where the warblers have been reported. There were lots of Yellow-rumped Warblers, but we weren’t having much luck with the more unusual birds, until the Black-and-white Warbler finally showed up. We got some nice shots of it. That was the highlight of the trip.

We then walked to the ‘Cattail Crawl’ where I have had luck finding warblers in the Cottonwood trees in the past. The Cottonwoods hadn’t gotten their leaves yet, and there weren’t many birds there.

We got there at about 8:45am and spent 3 hours. I took a few pictures in addition to the Black-and-white. As usual, there were a lot of birds to see there – 128 species have been reported so far this month.