Saturday on the Katy Prairie

.We had a spectacular dawn on Saturday.

Dee and I decided to check out the retention ponds on the CyFair campus, because when I was leaving work on Friday, I noticed that 1000+ water birds had settled on the ponds. Unfortunately, most of the birds had left by the time we arrived on Saturday. All that were left were some 300 Ring-necked Ducks, 100+ Ameriucan Coots, and two Pied-billed Grebes, two Redheads and two Canvasbacks.

Our next stop was at the Cypress Creek bridge on Sharp Road. The very first bird I saw there was the female Eastern Towhee that has been hanging out there for weeks.

Two Fox Sparrows were out in the open but quickly fled.

Several other sparrows were feeding but would not let us get close. A Brown Thrasher was more obliging.

Although the wind was really picking up now, we stopped at the Bear Creek bridge on Longenbaugh to see if the Pyrrhuloxia was visible. It wasn't. But as consolation a Wilson's Snipe was foraging in the mud below the bridge.

So it wasn't a good morning's birding but it still produced some nice sightings.
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