[All photographs copyright, Gary Nunn 2013] – I thought I was imagining things today when a rufous bird with bright yellow underparts flew into a cypress tree in front of me at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. Did I just see a Great Kiskadee? But then a single loud call came out of the cypress tree, “huu-ipp”, and I knew immediately it was in fact the Great Crested Flycatcher Myiarchus crinitus I had just seen dive in to the tree with its glowing yellow belly. I ran over but the bird had vanished. Not again! This reminded me of what happened the other day!

After alerting birders to the presence of the flycatcher only Barbara Carlson made it down to the cemetery. I have to admit against my advice since it was getting so late. However I decided to wait for Barbara to make sure she knew which tree I had seen the elusive flycatcher dive into. Barbara arrived at 6 pm and not more than 30 seconds later the flycatcher suddenly started calling again repeatedly from the cypress tree. We ran around the wall to get on to the highway and, sure enough, there sat the Great Crested Flycatcher on a Cape Plumbago bush consuming an enormous green katydid! It then flew over to a large flowering eucalyptus where I obtained some more nice photographs. Evidently this very rare flycatcher had been hidden away since I first found it on 09 Oct 2013 and was located just a few hundred yards away from the original location.

Great Crested Flycatcher – Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma, San Diego 11 Oct 2013

Great Crested Flycatcher – Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma, San Diego 11 Oct 2013

Great Crested Flycatcher – Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma, San Diego 11 Oct 2013

Great Crested Flycatcher – Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma, San Diego 11 Oct 2013

Great Crested Flycatcher – Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma, San Diego 11 Oct 2013

Great Crested Flycatcher – Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma, San Diego 11 Oct 2013

Great Crested Flycatcher – Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma, San Diego 11 Oct 2013

The call of Great Crested Flycatcher is quite easy to recognize and monotonous enough not to be confusing in my opinion. A very well matched recording to the call of the bird today in Point Loma can be found at this link below.