Badlands Expedition June 9-11, 2023

Badlands Expedition

Red-headed Woodpecker (nesting) in a dead cottonwood at the Theodore Roosevelt National Park North Unit group site. Bull snake spotted slithering down the tree, no doubt having made an attempt to eat eggs or fledglings. 

House Wren

Bobolink

Common Yellowthroat

Field Sparrow

Sprague's Pipit

Prairie Falcon

Rock Wren

Spotted Towhee

Lazuli Bunting

Yellow-breasted Chat

Red-eyed Vireo

American Robin

Grasshopper Sparrow

American White Pelican

Yellow Warbler

Eastern and Western Kingbirds

Canada Geese

Least Flycatcher 

Mourning Doves

Ovenbird

Oriole (uncertain which kind)

Common Nighthawk

Western Meadowlark

Lots of crickets and butterflies. Blue sky with some haze from forest fires and such. Very dark sky at night with bright Venus and many stars. Toads and cottontails and bison and long-horn cattle. Buttes, draws, washes, prairie, mud, gumbo, slumps, sinkholes, petrified wood, sandstone. And quiet. 

Little Missouri River fairly high. Landscape very green and lush. Flora and fauna: (much of these in bloom): junegrass, western wheatgrass, skunkbush sumac, cleft gromwell, lance-leaf bluebells, wild blue flax, prickly pear, Missouri pincushion, woods rose, wild prairie roses (most deep pink, a few white), western wallflower, prairie ragwort, western salsify, western virgin's bower, butte candle, rubber rabbitbrush, chokecherry, pin cherry, pussy toes, fleabane, sego lily, gumbo lily, rubber rabbitbush, poison ivy, buckbrush, yarrow, Indian hemp, catnip, white milkwort, scarlet guara, coneflower, scarlet globemallow, wood lily, gayfeather, narrow leaf penstemon, prairie turnip, sawsepal penstemon, prairie smoke, juniper (Rocky Mountain, prickly, and creeping), sage (including artemisia tridentada), COTTONWOODS including one dating to 1641.

All-day strenuous hike with Badlands Conservation Alliance. One wood tick. Cool temperatures and a nice breeze. Delightful camaraderie and delicious food, on the trail and in our campsites.