I was with my guide, Jake Thompson of Arizona Birding Guides, in upper Madera Canyon in the Santa Rita Mountains. He saw a small bird high in a tree and Jake got very, very excited. He said it was a red-eyed vireo, the first one he'd ever seen in Arizona. He'd been guiding at some big event earlier in the year, I think in Ohio, where red-eyed vireos were all over the place. He was so excited he was shaking and he got on his phone and posted a rare bird alert on eBird. Jake has seen more than 400 species of birds in a year in Arizona on multiple occasions and I believe he has seen over 500 species of birds in Arizona overall. He got to add another species this day to his total. He provided a trip summary at the end which included all of his eBird reports. This is what he noted about the red-eyed vireo: "Rare vagrant. Originally heard singing. Vireo larger than WAVI, with dark eyeline, red eye, and gray cap with dark outline. Olive green wings lacking wing bars. Scrutinized for YGVI. Seen near here 31.70461, -110.87691. Photographed and recorded."


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| Illustration from Birds of the World. |
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| You can see from the range, from Birds of the World, that it was quite a bit out of its normal area. The closest it normally gets is far eastern New Mexico. |
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