Baytown Nature Center

.
I took advantage of the Labor Day Weekend to drive down to Baytown Nature Center.

As usual,  the bay had plenty of Brown Pelicans, Neotropic Cormorants and Laughing Gulls as well as a few Forster's Terns.

Yellow-crowned Night Herons were everywhere. Juveniles were in the ditches and in trees.

Adults were plentiful also.

Great Blue Herons (below) and Great Egrets were perched in trees all over the site.

Snowy Egrets were busy fishing.

Killdeer were everywhere but the other shorebirds I was hoping for were not. Apart from a handful of semipalmated Sandpipers I saw only a solitary Black-necked Stilt (below) and four Spotted Sandpipers (below).

 

If shorebirds were scarce, flowers were certainly not. 

 

 

 

 

My final sighting before leaving the site was a Green Heron, a common bird here but one that I never tire of watching.

.

Nevada and Utah Trip: Salt Lake City

.
After our days in and around Cedar City we went to Salt Lake City for the weekend. Most of our time there was spent visiting with friends but I did see a few birds, like this Black-billed Magpie.

Monday morning I was up and out early, wanting to drive up Big Cottonwood Canyon to do some birding around Brighton and Silver Lake.

The drive up and down the canyon is notable for scenic views.

Outside the Visitor Center there was a large sign warning about the presence of moose and what to do if you encounter one. I'd always wanted to see moose but I'd never managed it - and I didn't expect to see any on this trip either. Deer are a different matter, though, and this one was waiting for me on the lakeside trail.

It is always a delight to walk the trail around the lake.

My main target bird for the day was Steller's Jay and I was lucky enough to spot several beside the Visitor Center.

It took a while before I could get a photo that showed this species' plumage.

There were other birds around, of course. American Robins were everywhere.

White-crowned Sparrows were plentiful, too.

This young White-crowned seemed to think he was invisible and so I was able to get a close-up shot.

A female Brewer's Blackbird was another bird that let me get a close-up.

So I'd spent a pleasant hour in Brighton, even though I hadn't seen anything very exciting. I headed back to my car to start the drive down to Salt Lake City. Then suddenly a deer galloped across in front of me. Except it wasn't a deer. It was a moose. Yes!

So I can finally cross "moose" off my list of American animals I'd like to see. Now I just have to find some way to see a wolf, a bear and a mountain lion.
.

Nevada & Utah Trip: Cedar City

.
Most of our time in Utah was spent in our relatives' house, perched at 7,500 feet and overlooking Cedar City.
 

 

A single hummingbird feeder on the deck attracted a succession of Black-chinned, Broad-tailed and Rufous Hummingbirds.

 

 
Other birds were scarce around the house, although I saw fly-throughs by Lesser Goldfinch, Western Scrub Jays and Northern Flickers. Every morning a bird would sing (cheep, cheep and then a descending trill) from somewhere nearby but I could never locate it. On our final day I managed to see that it was a Spotted Towhee.

Several hundred feet above the house there is a small lake that had American Coots, Mallards and a Sora. Even  higher than that there is a lookout area which I always enjoy visiting. Western Scrub Jays were surveying their territory from the tops of bushes there.

Black-capped Chickadees foraged in other bushes, while Green-tailed Towhees explored the ground.

Further up the mountainside I stopped to look for woodpeckers. After an hour I had seen Green-tailed Towhees, a Mountain Bluebird and a pair of House Wrens (below) but no woodpeckers.

Then my luck changed. A pair of Northern Flickers called and bowed to each other in a mating display on a distant tree-top. Then, a little nearer, there was a familiar drumming sound. It took a while but I finally located the source: a Hairy Woodpecker.

Another morning I drove the few miles to Kolob Canyon, part of Zion National Park. The canyon is lined with spectacular cliffs.

The ridge walk at the top looks over towards the main section of Zion NP.

I was hoping to see California Condors and perhaps some large raptors from the ridge. Instead I saw only Western Scrub Jays, Common Ravens and White-throated Swifts.

On yet another morning we all traveled to Cedar Breaks National Monument. But I'll report on that in my next blog.
.    

Nevada & Utah Trip: Las Vegas

.
The birding part of my vacation started when I spent 3 early-morning hours at the Henderson Bird Viewing Preserve outside Las Vegas. I did an hour's walk alone and then spent almost 2 hours being driven around on a golfcart by one of the volunteer staff. 

The site was surprisingly beautiful for a re-purposed sewage plant.

 

Birds were everywhere, as were desert cotton-tail rabbits.

The various ponds had a good selection of ducks, many with ducklings in tow.

 Mallards

Ruddy Ducks

 Redheads

Male Ruddy Duck

Ring-necked Duck

Common Gallinules also had young with them, as did American Coots.

I was excited to see many Western Grebes, in addition to some Eared Grebes.

There were even a few Pied-billed Grebes.

A Great Blue Heron and a Least Bittern disappeared too fast to photograph but a Green Heron was less skittish.

Several Canada Geese were hanging our on a path, right next to where a Killdeer was sitting on her eggs.

Shorebirds included Least Sandpipers, Wilson's Phalaropes and Black-necked Stilts (below).

A Marbled Godwit was feeding near a few American Avocets.

Several other species were flitting or running around near the ponds but were too distant or too fast to photograph: Bewick's and Marsh Wrens, Great-tailed Grackle, Brown-headed Cowbird, Crissal's Thrasher, Verdin, Greater Roadrunner and Yellow-headed Blackbirds.

I was luckier with some Black-tailed Gnatcatchers and a Costas's Hummingbird at the Visitor Center.

My 40th species of the morning was a Say's Phoebe.

If I ever go back to Las Vegas, I will certainly go back to the Henderson Preserve. It was a beautiful site with excellent birding, and the staff were extremely friendly and helpful. It is rather a pity that in the summer it is open only from 6:00 to noon.
.