New Mexico

Juvenile White-crowned Sparrow - by Marcel Such

Bottomless Lakes State Park, New Mexico

We drove from Fort Stockton, Texas to Las Vegas, New Mexico today.  We stopped in Roswell, NM, best known for its obsession with unidentified flying objects.  Nearby were two sites of interest to us … Bottomless Lakes State Park where we get out and stretch our legs with a good brisk hike.  This place is known for its small lakes, which are actually water filled sinkholes (17 to 90 feet deep).  There were lots of White-crowned Sparrows flitting about and some waterfowl on some of the larger lakes.  Our highlight bird was a Clark’s Grebe on Lea Lake.

We also stopped in at Bitter Lake National Wildlife Refuge.  The birding was pretty slow here, but we met the manager of Las Vegas National Wildlife Refuge who was here visiting for the day.  He told us that they still had thousands of Snow and Ross’s Geese at his reserve and that we’d likely be there all by ourselves to watch them fly away in the morning!