New Yard Bird

On Monday, we had a new species show up in our backyard. It was a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. Unfortunately, it was just passing through and hasn't been seen again.

A Blue-gray Gnatcatcher

Coincidentally, when we spent two hours at Sheldon Lake Environmental Center last week, six of the eight birds that we saw were Blue-gray Gnatcatchers.

Note:
This takes our yard list to 42. That's bird species seen in our yards since we moved to Cypress in January 2005. Of course, the number would be a lot higher if we counted birds that overfly our property!

Before and After Hurricane Ike

On Wednesday, we had to evacuate Surfside because of Hurricane Ike, and so we drove home via Galveston, with a side trip over to the Audubon beach on Bolivar.

The beach was as full of birds as ever.

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We were hoping to see Magnificent Frigatebirds on the ferry ride but had scores of views of Bottlenose Dolphins instead.

The hurricane came early Saturday morning and it was still strong when it passed over Cypress. However, we were lucky: We lost only some tree limbs and our pwer went out for just one day.

I posted a while back about how woodpeckers ride out storms by clinging to trees. During Ike, I was able to see one of our Red-bellied Woodpeckers doing just that. It hunkered down against the trunk of our elm and kept moving to whichever side was most sheltered.

P.S.

We won't be going to Galveston or Bolivar again any time soon. The island was very badly hit and the peninsula was really devastated. Like us, Surfside got the "clean" side of the storm but even that was enough to cause a huge amount of damage. Ike had one good result, though. The public beach there was rather spoiled by 14 houses built years ago right on the waterline. Apparently, 10 of those houses aren't there any more!

Vacation Interrupted

On Monday we went down to Surfside, where we had rented a beach house for four days. It was perfect weather and the location was great for fishing (for my daughter's partner, Jose-Luis) and birding (for me). The first afternoon, we sat on the deck watching Willets and Laughing Gulls arguing on the beach as a Reddish Egret hunted in the surf. Jose-Luis was thrilled to catch a small Hammerhead Shark.

Jose-Luis enjoying Surfside beach ...

while a Reddish Egret fished a few yards away

The next day, I drove to Brazoria for dawn to do some early-morning birding. Most of the refuge's ponds were dry but there were still enough birds to make the trip worthwhile. Amazingly, there were absolutely no mosquitoes, a first for Brazoria. It was particularly good to see large numbers of adult and juvenile Black-crowned Night Herons, mixed in with Roseate Spoonbills, Black-necked Stilts and various Egrets.

Dawn at Brazoria National Wildlife Refuge

Black-crowned Night Heron and Roseate Spoonbill

Killdeer in the early morning light

Later in the morning, I drove along the beach at Surfside and was rewarded with great views of shorebirds, including American Oystercatchers, Willets, Black-bellied Plovers and Ruddy Turnstones. Gulls and terns were plentiful, as were Brown Pelicans (including a couple which were mating).

Black-bellied Plover

American Oystercatcher

Tern

Brown Pelicans

In the afternoon, Jose-Luis continued, encouraged by having caught a second, larger shark. The rest of us went to Brazoria, where my daughter Emma saw her first Roseate Spoonbills.

Great Egret at Brazoria

Roseate Spoonbills (with White Ibis and Snowy Egrets)

Our visit ended well when Emma spotted a young coyote wandering among the flowers by the side of the exit road.

We all woke up on Wednesday looking forward to more beautiful days in Surfside, which Jose-Luis had decided was "paradise." Unfortunately, Hurricane Ike intervened: A mandatory evacuation order was issued and we had to pack up and leave at 10:00 a.m. So much for paradise!

Brazos Bend State Park

Yesterday morning, we took my daughter, her partner and our grandson to Brazos Bend State Park for a picnic.
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The park seemed unusually quiet for birds but was still well worth a visit.
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40-Acre Lake

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40-Acre Lake had scores of Common Moorhens and 7-8 Green Herons, as well as a few Great and Snowy Egrets, White Ibis, Anhingas, Cormorants, Little Blue Herons, Eastern Kingbirds and Red-winged Blackbirds.

Green Heron

Anhinga

Common Moorhen Family

White Ibis
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We also saw 14 alligators, including this one lying on the path.
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At Elm Lake, the birding situation was similarly quiet, except for scores of Black-bellied Whistling Ducks.
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The picnic area was busy with noisy American Crows - and swarms of dragonflies.

Busy Backyard

Our backyard is very busy at the moment. Birds and butterflies visit regularly, and squirrels pop in regularly, too. Hornets are building a nest on top of one of our deck beams, and digger bees have taken over a small patch of ground outside our living-room windows.

All this activity is keeping our cats occupied.

Our older cat, Petra, spends hours looking out at the scores of digger bees, which seem to spend all day staging dogfights. Luckily, the bees restrict themselves to "their" patch and don't bother us when we cross it. Petra also likes watching hummingbirds and there currently are enough migrating Ruby-throated Hummingbirds arguing over our feeders to keep her happy.

Our younger cat, Tiger, has taken to sitting near our shed and watching a small hole in the fence that blocks off our brush pile from the rest of the yard. We couldn't work out what she was stalking until two nights ago, when we caught a young possum finishing off some leftover cat food on our deck.

The possum was back last night. It snacked on cat food, washed this down with a drink from our fountain, and then disappeared through the fence hole into the brush pile. So it's now pretty clear what Tiger has been watching for.

Pleasant Morning at Bear Creek Park

Yesterday morning I drove down to Bear Creek Park. After all the rain of the past week, I expected much of the park to be flooded and so was hoping to see herons, egrets and ibis. I was also expecting the mosquitoes to be fierce.

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As it turned out, there were no flooded areas, no wading birds and - most surprising of all - no mosquitoes. Instead, the park was busy with warblers. I saw several Pine Warblers and a Black-and-white. Worm-eating Warblers were reported earlier in the week and I'm 99% sure I spotted one. (This would be a life bird for me.) Unfortunately, it was one of those mornings where my glasses and binoculars steamed up every time that I focused on a bird. Since I can't be 100% sure of what I saw, I can't add the Worm-eating to my list.

The park produced plenty of other birds, including many Eastern Bluebirds and American Crows, plus a Great Crested Flycatcher.

American Crow

However, the highlight wasn't a bird at all. It was a raccoon. I love raccoons and I don't see them very often, even though they are very common here. This one was particularly obliging and allowed me to take several photos from just a few yards away.

Better Late Than Never

I've been thinking about it for a long time but I could never quite bring myself to take the plunge. Going vegetarian, I mean. But now I've decided and I have sworn off meat.

I know that at 62 I've left my decision rather late. But at least from now on I won't need to feel so guilty about:
a. eating animals
b. eating animals that have been reared and slaughtered in the most appalling way
c. contributing to the widespread destruction of habitat that is caused by the production of beef.

I can foresee only one major difficulty with my decision: I don't really like most vegetables and fruits. (Thank goodness chocolate isn't a meat product or I'd be sunk right away!) I suppose I'll manage, though.

What will I miss the most? Bacon and ham. I really love bacon and ham. Cooked breakfasts are never going to be the same again.

Yard Birds

This past week, we've been too busy painting and getting floors tiled to fit in any birding trips. However, I have had time to look out of our windows and also to look around our yards while watering them.

Our backyard hummer feeders and Turk's Cap plants are the scene of constant skirmishes between 3-5 Ruby-throated Hummingbirds. It's hard to know how many birds we're seeing, because only one female is tough enough to stay and feed for more than a few seconds. The others fly in and are immediately chased away.

The front yard is busy with a variety of birds. White-winged Doves are frequent visitors to the feeders, a Mourning Dove often browses the lawn, and a pair of Inca Doves turned up the other day to use the bird bath. Whenever I put the sprinkler on, several Blue Jays and some of our 6-7 resident Northern Cardinals sit on branches and preen in the spray.

One female House Finch is a constant visitor, but a family of six others also comes to eat our sunflower seeds. The latter draw a Carolina Wren and Carolina Chickadees, too.

The suet feeder in our elm tree really belongs to our resident Northen Mockingbird. However, when he/she isn't around, it attracts White-winged Doves, Carolina Chickadees, a pair of Downy Woodpeckers and another Mockingbird. The elm is also very popular with our family of three Red-bellied Woodpeckers. On Saturday, the latter were outraged to find another Red-bellied trying to muscle in. They kept chasing him away. Then they'd leave and he would sneak back. They would return and chase him off again. It went on like this for hours.

So although there are no unusual or exotic birds in our yards at present, the antics of our normal residents and visitors are always worth watching.

Attwater Refuge

We spent yesterday morning at Attwater Prairie Chicken Refuge with Carlos and Macarena Aguilar. It was generally quiet for birds but certainly still worth visiting.

The whole site was busy with butterflies, particularly Black Swallowtails.

The entrance road and the Sycamore Trail were lined with many different kinds of wildflowers.

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Although the Sycamore Trail produced my first Northern Bobwhite of the year, we saw very few birds until we reached the waterlogged fields near the end of the auto loop. This area had scores of Great Egrets, White Ibis and Cattle Egrets, plus several Tricolored Herons, Snowy Egrets and immature Little Blue Herons.

Cow with Cattle Egrets

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At the lake, we were rewarded by the sight of a group of Roseate Spoonbills feeding against a backdrop of water lilies.

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The lake also had good numbers of Great and Snowy Egrets, immature Little Blue Herons, Tricolored Herons, Black-necked Stilts and American Coots.

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We enjoyed watching a Tricolored Heron fishing like an Umbrella Bird, holding its wings out in front of its head to shade the water and allow it to see its prey.

While having lunch near the visitor center, we met two young wildlife interns, who were on their way to feed Prairie Chicken chicks. In an attempt to boost the declining number of Prairie Chickens at the refuge, 40 chicks raised in captivity have been imported to the site and will be released when they are old enough to survive unaided.

The total count of birds we saw in 90 minutes of walking and driving around the refuge was 27 species.

Trouble With Warblers

Warblers are exceptionally beautiful birds but they cause birders a lot of trouble.

First, warblers are small birds, typically around 5" in length. So they are much harder to spot and watch than bigger birds, such as Mockingbirds and Cardinals.

Second, many warblers tend to flit around high in the tree tops, forcing birders to strain their heads back in order to watch the birds. The result is "warbler neck," a common affliction among birdwatchers during migration seasons.

Then there is the problem of movement. Unlike many other birds, warblers rarely perch for long in one place or in exposed positions. They are insect-eaters and so they are constantly in motion, foraging among leaves and twigs, looking for bugs. This makes it very difficult to get good looks at them. And it makes it extremely difficult to get good photos or video of them! (Video is particularly hard to shoot: For a still picture you need the bird to stay in one place for a fraction of a second, but for video you need it to stay there for several seconds.)

This morning I decided to use my coffee break to film some of the warblers that have been frequenting our campus nature trail. Finding the birds was easy: Within 5 minutes I'd spotted an American Redstart and Wilson's, Chestnut-sided and Black-throated Greeen Warblers. Filming the birds was a different matter. After 20 minutes of clambering through undergrowth and being eaten alive by mosquitoes, I had lots of video footage of leaves with only the occasional blurred frame of part of a wing or tail.

I decided to give up and go back to work. That was when a Black-throated Green Warbler took pity on me and allowed me to film the short clips shown below.

More Migrants at Work

I went into work early this morning, hoping that a cold front might have brought some migrating birds to the CyFair college campus. My hunch paid off! There were lots of new birds in the clump of trees at the start of the nature trail.

First up were two flycatchers, who gave me very good looks and were even obliging enough to pose for photos on various trees and shrubs. Unfortunately, they were Empidax flycatchers, of which we get three almost identical species. So they were fun to watch but impossible to identify.

Empidonax Flycatcher

The next bird up was impossible to mistake: a Blackburnian Warbler. His plumage was so stunning that I forgot to use my camera until he was disappearing into the foliage. So this is the only photo I got.

Blackburnian Warbler

The next hour was hectic as I scrambled around in the undergrowth, following a succession of other warblers and trying to get photos of them while trying to avoid stepping in fire ant nests. However, taking photos of such restless birds as warblers is not easy, particularly with a digital camera. (Digital cameras have a significant time-lag between when you press the release and when the shutter actually opens.) I ended up with photo after photo of branches that a warbler had just left. Very frustrating!

Overall, though, I had an excellent hour's birding. As well as Blackburnian and Magnolia Warblers, I had good looks at three new-for-2008 warblers: Canada, Wilson's and Black-throated Green. So my year list has moved to 188 species.

On Friday, I'd noticed a Carolina Wren using a nesting box by the trail and had found that she'd just started building a nest there. This morning the front of the box was hanging open and so I went to look. The nest was now complete - and the wren was sitting on it. She flew away when I closed up the box but hopefully she will return to lay her eggs.

Just as I was leaving, I noticed a different but familiar-looking bird on a tree top. A quick look through the binoculars confirmed that it was a female Orchard Oriole. Just at that moment, she was joined by a male in full breeding plumage. A great way to end a good hour's birding.

P.S. 5/13/08

A quick walk this morning revealed a very different story: Only one Empidonax and one Canada Warbler. However, I did spot a Rose-breasted Grosbeak, another new bird for the campus list.

Big Weekend: Bolivar Beach

I finally have time today to finish editing and posting photos of last weekend's trip.

On the way from High Island to Bolivar beach, we stopped for a few minutes at Rollover Pass. This is normally an excellent place to view a wide variety of sea birds and waders. Unfortunately, the site was fairly empty this time and the wind made it difficult to see very far. The only birds we spotted were right on the beach: Reddish Egret, Snowy Egret, Sanderling and Ruddy Turnstone.

Ruddy Turnstones at Rollover Pass

So we drove on to Retillon Road and Bolivar beach.

The blustery conditions were even worse at Bolivar, where we were forced to eat lunch in the car. However, the beach and sea were busy with birds.

Bolivar always has some interesting species, but the real beauty of the site is the sheer number of birds and the way many different species mix and interact together.

In the typical scene below, American Avocets provided a background to a mixed group of Laughing Gulls and Common, Royal and Sandwich Terns.

Nearby, a Royal Tern and a Laughing Gull shared a patch of beach with Ruddy Turnstones and Sanderlings.

While groups of Sanderlings huddled on the sand, individuals in a range of plumages scuttled around or picked at fish carcasses.

Brown and White Pelicans were present as expected, but more surprising was the number of American Oystercatchers, a much less common bird.

Bolivar wouldn't be Bolivar without a Reddish Egret or two. This time, there were several in their normal gray and rust plumage.

Even better, there were two white morph Reddish Egrets, a truly beautiful bird. The photo below shows one in a typical fishing pose. (They rush and jump around in the shallow water, extend their wings and stab at fish.)

P.S.

I was quite pleased to have seen 86 species in 24 hours. However, my sightings pale into insignificance beside those of other local birders. A week earlier, a team of Texas birders broke the US "big birding day" record: Their total on a day trip around Austin and the upper Texas Coast was 260 species!