On Friday, we continued our trip northwest along the Rio Grande. Our first stop was Roma Bluffs, which is an overlook above the river looking into Mexico. We’d already seen some border patrol activity – earlier in the trip we had some agents stop a truck just in front of us – but starting in…
Texas Gulf Coast / Rio Grande birding, Part Five
We started out Thursday at Frontera Audubon Center, which is a small location but which has a nice variety of habitat and lots of birds. In less than an hour and a half, I logged 24 species and two life birds to start off the day. The trails were tight in places but there were…
Texas Gulf Coast / Rio Grande birding, Part Four
On Wednesday morning, we went to Quinta Mazatlan. This World Birding Center site was beautiful and obviously very well cared for. The entrance had well landscaped areas with native flora. The visitor center had a room in it filled with local artwork – it was the most vibrant display I have ever seen. In…
Texas Gulf Coast / Rio Grande birding, Part Three
On Tuesday morning (February 6th) we traveled to the extreme tip of southern Texas, and I got my first look at the border. Very near the tip of Texas is the Sabal Palm Sanctuary, which was originally a late nineteenth century plantation. We spent just over two and a half hours here, and I picked…
Texas Gulf Coast / Rio Grande birding, Part Two
Sunday was the day of our boat trip to see Whooping Cranes. These tall (tallest in North America) and beautiful birds are endangered, and I believe there is less than one thousand in existence today. We woke up early to a nice sunrise outside the hotel. The trip would take us to small marshy islands…
Texas Gulf Coast / Rio Grande birding, Part One
Friday evening (Feb. 2nd) I arrived at the starting location for an eight day tour of Southern Texas – a La Quinta hotel in San Antonio. For the next nine nights, I was to stay in La Quinta hotels all over south Texas, with a group of six other intrepid explorers (including one fearless leader). …
Heading to Texas
On January 31st, I set off on a two-week trip to Texas. I had booked a spot in a Carolina Bird Club trip to bird southern Texas for eight days, and the plan was to drive there and back, birding as many states as possible. Someday, I would like to bird every state in the…
Backyard Birding
Backyard birdwatching is one of the most popular hobbies in the country. Therefore it is no surprise that occasionally a rare species will be discovered not by intrepid adventurers in the swamps or mountains, but by someone feeding the birds in their backyard, and noticing a strange bird eating the food from their feeders. Often,…
Cold at the Outer Banks
Over the last week, temperatures got extremely cold for an extended period of time. The eastern half of the state also got hit with a storm. Between the snow and the freezing cold, the birds were struggling to survive and did whatever they had to. In the case of the American Woodcock, it meant shedding…
Mergansers!
At the start of the new year, I resolved to see some new bird species. I haven’t spent much time looking for new species, since they just fall in your lap when you are starting out, and since I still had a lot to learn around identifying the common species. But now that I finished…