It
was another lovely day, and this time granddaughter Elena came with us! We headed straight to South Padre Island with
a stop at the Aplomado Falcon Observation Lot, where the only raptors we had
were Red-tailed Hawk, Kestrel, and one of many Osprey throughout the day, but
we ran into some other birders who were also staying at the Inn, and they got
us on the gang’s life Long-billed Curlew!
That was great!
Onto
the Island we went, and straight to the Flats, where the tide was way out, and so were the birds: the big flocks were non-existent! (Well, a single Greater Yellowlegs welcomed
us at the entrance… J) But
the good news was that the sun was perfect for views of several key species,
almost all of which were lifers for the gang:
Semipalmated, Black-bellied, and cute little Piping Plovers, Dunlin,
Ruddy Turnstones, and Sanderlings in the shorebird department, plus a few gulls
and terns of the expected varieties.
(Everyone in our car was teasing Dale behind his back as he hates
getting his cars dirty… J)
Greater Yellowlegs
Sanderlings
Fran scans the Flats for goodies...
Distant Brown Pelicans (with a token White)
Piping Plover
Royal Terns
From there we went to the Convention Centre where a Wilson’s Warbler was
very friendly, and a Savannah Sparrow out back sat up for scope views! Nothing new was on the mudflats, so we headed
onto the boardwalk where a pair of Clapper Rails grunted right away, and Dale
was actually able to spot it deep in the reeds!
The other folks only saw a few feathers if anything at all, so we were
hoping for a better view. Same thing
happened with the Sora (also deep in the reeds), and only a few of us got a
glimpse. The Common Gallinules were only
too cooperative of course, and we had great looks at White Ibis, Snowy Egrets,
Green, Tricolored, Great and Little Blue, and Black-crowned Night Herons! A Roseate Spoonbill wheeled in a one point,
which thrilled everyone, and a white morph Reddish Egret showed well in the
“east pond”, along with a Lesser Yellowlegs.
A Marsh Wren gave tantalizing glimpses, and on the way out to the pier
we spotted a few Least Sandpipers; on the way back a Northern Waterthrush pinked from the mangroves. On the way to the car Jim and I were treated
to a point-blank Ruby-crowned Kinglet in the “central area”!
Savannah Sparrow
Watching said Savannah Sparrow through the scope...
Scanning the Flats...
White Ibis on the boardwalk
Black-crowned Night Heron
Green Heron
Mottled Duck
Common Gallinule
Little Blue Herons
Jim tries his luck at digiscoping a Great Blue Heron (below)
American Wigeon at the end of the boardwalk; the green on the head only shows if the sun hits it right!
American Coots have lobed toes, unlike ducks!
From
there we headed over to the Birding Center, where we finished lunch in the
parking lot (and enjoyed watching an Osprey eat his lunch on the water tower) and were treated to another friendly
Wilson’s Warbler, and a Great-tailed Grackle that had found a deceased lizard
to dine on! We promised Fran she would
get her Mottled Ducks here, and she certainly did in spades, along with Rock
Pigeons that almost let us pet them, and more gallinules and coots. Out on the pier we were treated to hundreds
of Redheads and several American Wigeon in beautiful light, along with one of
the funky Reddish Egrets that had white patches in its wings! And speaking of white, we found what may have
been a leucistic female Redhead in the crowd, as she had quite a bit of pale
feathering on her nape!
Monarch in the Birding Center Parking Lot
Great Southern White
Statuesque Great Blue Heron
Mottled Duck pair
We found this leucistic female Redhead (right) in the mob!
Male Redhead parading across the flats
"The Boys"
Continuing on
the loop the hoped-for Soras never showed, but to Elena’s chagrin, a huge Alligator was basking on the bank;
he even shifted positions for us! (She
had seen the sign and was hoping the cold weather was keeping them
hidden…) A couple of male Blue-winged
Teal graced us, and comedy relief was provided by a Pied-billed Grebe that was
bullying a Redhead! But at the very last
“blind”, what should be swimming across the water but a Clapper Rail! Fran et al had fallen behind, so Kathie and I
yelled back for them to hurry, but unfortunately Fran never saw it before it
snuck into the reeds. But the good news
was that it snuck out the back and to another clump of reeds where she could finally see her rail! A Belted Kingfisher teased us on the way out.
Blue-winged Teal
Green Heron with "pantaloons"
Tricolored Heron
Redhead that was being bullied by a Pied-billed Grebe (that part got on video...)
An
alert had come over the RBA that the Tamaulipas Crow had been seen at Sea Ranch
Marina that morning, so we hightailed it over there next, but agreed that if
wasn’t a slam-dunk when we got there, we’d head on to the Hwy 48 Boat Ramp with
what time we had left, as (disappointingly) we had dipped on both Black
Skimmers and Black-bellied Whistling Ducks!
No crows (although a couple of grackles gave us a scare J), so we headed
across the causeway and south on 48. We
could see lots of shorebirds in the mudflats as we shot south, and at the boat
ramp, we “ramped up” (pun intended) several new species for the gang! What really
shocked me was four Wilson’s Plovers – I had them pegged as a summertime bird
and to not expect them! But the TOS
Handbook does say that they are “uncommon locally” in the Valley in winter, so
that explains it. Besides the plovers,
we bagged the skimmers, Avocets, Forster’s Terns, Short-billed Dowitchers,
Willets, and a Western Sandpiper as new birds for the group! A Caracara fed on a distant spit, and unfortunately
the Oystercatchers didn’t show, but I was thrilled to get those plovers!
Wilson's Plovers
The
guys and Elena opted to head back as Dale needed to run some errands, so we
three “Golden Girls” took the toll road (picking up a lovely White-tailed Hawk)
and discussed options for the next day.
But those whistling ducks were bugging me, and since we were a little ahead of time, it dawned
on me that I usually had lots of them at Harlingen City Lake, so we took a
detour (with “Google-Garman’s” help – I had never gone there from that
direction before), and when we got there, both the girls nearly fainted: there must have been at least 300 whistling
ducks packed up on the dam!
Unfortunately there were no Fulvous amongst them, but on the lake we
added Ring-necked and Ruddy Ducks for the day, along with a feral Muscovy! We also had good scope views of the
Double-crested Cormorants there, and were able to see the diagnostic orange
lores well.
Headed
home after that with 76 species for the day!
Bird list:
Black-bellied Whistling-Duck
Muscovy Duck American Wigeon
Mottled Duck
Blue-winged Teal
Northern Pintail
Redhead
Ring-necked Duck
Ruddy Duck
Pied-billed Grebe
Double-crested Cormorant
American White Pelican
Brown Pelican
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Snowy Egret
Little Blue Heron
Tricolored Heron
Reddish Egret
Green Heron
Black-crowned Night-Heron
White Ibis
Roseate Spoonbill
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
White-tailed Hawk
Red-tailed Hawk
Clapper Rail
Sora
Common Gallinule
American Coot
Black-necked Stilt
American Avocet
Black-bellied Plover
Wilson's Plover
Semipalmated Plover
Piping Plover
Killdeer
Spotted Sandpiper
Greater Yellowlegs
Willet
Lesser Yellowlegs
Long-billed Curlew
Ruddy Turnstone
Sanderling
Dunlin
Least Sandpiper
Western Sandpiper
Short-billed Dowitcher
Laughing Gull
Ring-billed Gull
Herring Gull
Caspian Tern
Forster's Tern
Royal Tern
Black Skimmer
Rock Pigeon
Belted Kingfisher
Crested Caracara
American Kestrel
Great Kiskadee
Loggerhead Shrike
House Wren
Marsh Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Northern Mockingbird
European Starling
Orange-crowned Warbler
Northern Waterthrush
Common Yellowthroat
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Wilson's Warbler
Savannah Sparrow
Red-winged Blackbird
Great-tailed Grackle
House Sparrow
76 SPECIES
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