Today was our last day birding Texas. Once again, we started out at the Convention Center and were lucky enough to have some super birder point out a PRAIRIE WARBLER. This guy is a bird photographer, and he told us this was the worst season for birding Texas in the last 10 to 15 years. Dry dry dry. (He’s the one who came up with the name “Laguna del Morte,” which I appropriated for a previous post.) His recommendation: Arizona. So we’ve added to our list, and we shall see. Driving out, we once again took old Port Isabel Road and saw a CASSIN’S SPARROW and BEWICK’S WREN. Then onward to today’s main event, the Santa Ann NWR.
Category Archives: lifers
murderers and birderers [206 – 221]
Another lifer we missed
South Padre Island isn’t just popular with birders and girls gone wild, it’s also big with escaped convicts and murderers. The day we got there, some concerned citizen claimed to have seen escaped murderer Richard Lee McNair hanging out among the tourists. He was all over the web a week or two ago in an extraordinary police video. You get to watch McNair convince the hapless cop who pulled him over that he’s got the wrong man. Amazing. Anyway, we didn’t see nothing and we ain’t saying a thing.
In today’s birding news, Pole and I headed off to the Sabal Palm Audubon Center and Sanctuary, which is south of Brownsville, near the Mexican border. A very lush place, but — you guessed it — hotter than hell. Lots of paths and walkways, and lots of birds, too. It was even more uncomfortable than our trip to High Island, where we burned beyond recognition. Our system today was to go out for short expeditions and then return, panting, to the water fountain at the visitor center.
laguna del morte [192 – 205]
Osprey with digitally docked tail
First thing today, we checked out the South Padre Island Convention Center, which is supposed to be a good spot. It was. It’s right on the water, and strolling in the sands we saw BLACK SKIMMERS and a BLACK-BELLIED PLOVER. It would have been nice to see a skimmer actually skimming, but we did see it actually being black (and white and orange), which is something.
Plenty of birders were ogling the shrubbery near the center, so we joined them, managing to see a BLACKPOLL WARBLER, a SCARLET TANAGER, and a TENNESSEE WARBLER. In a year or two, the convention center is going to become the World Birding Center, which sounds pretty highfalutin’. But what that means beyond a gift shop, I can’t tell you. At present, though, they’ve built a nice walkway through the marsh to the water, and that’s where I digiscoped the osprey. There’s a large water tower nearby, and a nice old couple pointed out a small hawk perched high up on one of its railings. With a scope, it proved to be a PEREGRINE FALCON.
like hell, but with sno-cones [179 – 191]
And don't forget the venomous ivy
Today started as another driving day, this time from Rockport to South Padre Island. We paused at a rest stop along the way, and saw the amazing sign on the right. Never mind that they mean “venomous,” not “poisonous,” but what halfwit is going to walk their pet after reading such a warning? Only in Texas. Lots of boat-tailed grackles here, and this was the first time we heard their outrageous squawking. They can make the most hellish, unbirdlike sounds imaginable. That must be why they’re called “niños del diablo.” (I just made that up.)
We drove south on Route 77, a raptor hotspot, and sure enough, we spotted a CRESTED CARACARA and HARRIS’S HAWK in short order. Pole got to claim them first because she saw them longer and knew what to look for. But we saw more of both before long, so I got to check them off, too. In fact, the Harris’s were all over the place.
playtime for turkeys [174 – 178]
No, ma'am, we sure won't
Last night we drove south to Rockport. Most of the drive was in the dark, and we passed several refineries glowing in the night. Ugly places — talk about your Dark Satanic Mills. Our first birding stop this morning was Goose Island State Park, which is on the Lamar peninsula. Before we entered the park proper, we stopped off to see the Big Tree, which is the Texas State Champion Oak, whatever the hell that means. It’s a big ol’ tree, and best of all, we saw a BLACK-CRESTED TITMOUSE in its branches, a lifer for us both. The area was different from most what we’d seen in Texas so far, since there wasn’t garbage everywhere. The reason? The Lamar Women’s Club. (See photo.)