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We were driving from Vernal to Salt Lake Saturday (July 24) about 9:30 in the morning, and detoured to see what the wetlands area below Jordanelle Dam was like. We drove up to the Good Sam RV park and back to the highway, with a brief stop at the entrance that has the stone pillars and parking area. The road crosses a slough or small stream about .2 miles north of the stone pillars. We were going south (back toward the stone pillars) when we saw the bird, about 15 feet from the edge of the road, between the road and the fence, just north of the little pond or slough. It was in sight for a half minute or so, then it slunk off in the thick grass.
Our first thought was that it was a common moorhen (which we’ve been wanting to see). However, as we watched the bird, we could see the body was bluish-purple ,the back was a lovely, delicate, olive color, and the front of the face was a big, whitish blob, instead of the red portion of the big yellow-and-red beak continuing up between the eyes. We stopped back Sunday on the way home and walked through the area for a while but did not see the Purple Gallinule again, although Cliftia thought she did hear it again, in the same area. We did see quite a few other birds in this really neat wetlands area. We’ll stop there regularly from now on.
PS We’ve had a white-winged dove show up at our feeder in Jensen (Uintah County) in May in 2002, and again in 2004…
Clay and Cliftia Johnson
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