The Middle Daughter (TMD) and I recently had the chance to take a four-day trip to the coast with very few time constraints. We left early on Wednesday and arrived back in Helena early Saturday evening. We had two clear objectives: pick up The Youngest Daughter (TYD), and see at least one Tufted Puffin. Both objectives were met. But, as they used to say – Getting there is half the fun!
TYD had originally planned to fly home, but TMD and I dreamt up a road trip plan that would give us a chance to take pictures and get those Puffins onto a good and proper eBird list. Thankfully, TYD agreed to cancel her flights, and we headed out to retrieve her.
So, why Tufted Puffins?
We were all in Cannon Beach about ten years ago and watched Puffins flying all around Haystack Rock – a well-known nesting site during the breeding season. However, we weren’t keeping track on eBird or iNaturalist at that point in time. TMD and I could have forced them onto our life lists retroactively, but really, where’s the fun in that? And besides “Roadtrip!”
Following 2025’s poor birdiing year (due to unforeseen circumstances we ended 2025 with a paltry 174 species), we’ve had a pretty good year-to-date for 2026. We were sitting at 180 species before we hit the road, meaning we would almost certainly hit 200 by the end of the year even without this trip – if we maintained a solid effort. Re-visiting Cannon Beach and driving to get there and back offered the perfect opportunity to add quite a few new species to our annual tally.
Because of that, we decided to turn this travel opportunity into a four-day BioBlitz, pushing to cross the 200-species mark before the middle of the year. Our best year ever was 210 species. The prospect of hitting 200 in June – and putting 220 or more in play by the end of the year – was simply too good to pass up.
Long story short: we counted every single bird we saw for the entire trip. We took dozens of side trips to get onto backroads, routed ourselves near natural areas with trails, and constantly reviewed eBird lists from fellow birders to improve our chances. We were up and on the road by 7:00am and birded until after 9:00pm all four days.
And it worked.
Over those four days, we tallied 124 positively ID’ed species, logged 1,902 miles, walked miles of trails, took hundreds (and hundreds) of pictures, ate great food, and engaged with nature multiple times each day across four states.
The final tally? We are now at 206 for the year-to-date. That puts us puts us well within striking distance of a new record for the year.
The goal is not just about the numbers, though. While it is fun to make a special effort like this, it is more important to spend time engaging with nature across such a beautiful stretch of country, and it is really nice to see improvement year-over-year.
In the end, though the real goal was to get the family back together for the summer.
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