4/21/21
While visiting family in Austin, Annu and Arun decided to come to the Valley where Annu could indulge in her passion of bird photography (Arun was along for the ride J but admittedly was a great spotter)! She was primarily interested in the Green Jay, but also orioles and tanagers (all the colorful stuff J), so since there was still a north wind blowing, I insisted that the Island was the place to go, and suggested another park where they could go on their own to get the Green Jay et al.
It was another beautiful, sunny day (with intermittent clouds), and I was a little concerned when I saw that the numbers were definitely down at the Convention Centre from where they had been the last couple of days, but I needn’t have worried: even one male Baltimore Oriole was enough to send Annu into ecstasy! J I somewhat let her off the leash to go chase whatever she wanted to chase; Orchard Orioles were, of course, still there in numbers, and I pointed out a Wood Thrush next to the wall. Arun had gone ahead to deliver the bag of oranges I had brought, but soon came running back with a picture of a “little green bird” he had taken with his iPhone, and it was a female Painted Bunting! He also described seeing a bird that sounded like a male (he admitted he wasn’t the birder J), but since Painted Bunting was #1 on Annu’s Want List, we headed over to where he had seen the female, and indeed got great looks (although the male refused to come out). We then wandered over to the water feature where Peggy and one of her Angels was getting ready to put out seed for the buntings, so Annu asked to tag along! So back we went to where the female had been, and after the Mottled Ducks and grackles had had their fill, eventually the male came out in all his glory! Annu was beyond thrilled! J
Annu gets her first Baltimore Oriole (below)!
Female Orchard Oriole
Catbird
Wood Thrush
Arun shows Annu the female Painted Bunting (below)
From
there we just wandered towards the “back yard” where we ran into Daryl again
(he and Mary had to return to Sequin to take care of a few things, but then
came right back when I told them about potential fallout conditions later in
the week!), and more “jewels”: American
Redstart, Yellow-breasted Chat, Gray-cheeked Thrush, and more orioles came to
the fore! Annu almost died when someone
pointed out the male Scarlet Tanager – what a stunner! Further down was a herd of Black-bellied
Whistling Ducks, plus a small group of Indigo Buntings in all plumages, plus
the vagrant “Oregon” Junco that had been reported earlier in the week (yes,
they really are rare down here J)! Annu just plopped herself down close to the
action, and soon yet another Painted Bunting came out! She was definitely in Heaven! J Arun spotted an Eastern Kingbird flopping
around in the back, and both Clay-colored and Savannah Sparrows were still
around. I took a cursory look at the
Flats just to pad the list (Annu had gotten plenty of waterbird photos in
Florida, so she preferred to concentrate on the songbirds): Skimmers, Royal and Least Terns, shorebirds
that were too far out for me to ID with the bins L, plus tons of
Franklin’s Gulls wafting over throughout the morning were the main players in
that department. Annu was also delighted
with the multitude of Barn Swallows swooping around, and we enjoyed a mom
Mottled Duck leading her brood back to the Flats while fending off an
opportunistic grackle trying to make a snack out of one of her little ones!
Annu in the "Back Yard"
Despite
having been in Florida, she hadn’t seen either Purple Gallinule or Least
Bittern, so we went out on the boardwalk to find them. The bittern was uncharacteristically
cooperative (as the pair had been throughout the week), as was a nice Pectoral
Sandpiper, but the gallinule was a no-show (Arun was delighted with the Coot J). We staked out the Magic Mesquite for a while
and found a Wilson’s Warbler and Yellow-breasted Chat, but in the meantime
local birding buddy Kristy found the gallinule and came running over to tell us! So we went traipsing back over and got “here
and there” looks as he kept hiding under the boardwalk (which is why we
probably couldn’t find him in the first place)!
A Kentucky Warbler was hiding in the grass, and a quick look at East
Pond added Redhead and Stilt Sandpiper to the list. While all this was going on the local yellow-nosed
Snowy Egret flew over!
We
moseyed back to the Back Yard and enjoyed more tanagers on the
ground, plus a Northern Parula in one of the mesquites. After that we headed to Stripes for one of
their famous tacos, then checked out the Sheepshead lots; while Arun and I
chilled on the “Sunny Side”, Annu was able to approach a Summer Tanager almost within
petting distance! She was beyond
thrilled (and running out of room on her card J)! The drip hosted a Yellow Warbler and another chat,
and while we were watching a sapsucker flew in under our noses and attached
herself to a nearby tree! We also logged
Swainson’s Thrushes and tame Hooded Warblers, and when Arun came running over from
the “dark side” to tell us to come look at some huge birds, they turned out to
be Yellow-headed Blackbirds! A stunning
male Rose-breasted Grosbeak was also at the drip, but aside from those two
additions, it was pretty quiet.
Annu and Chip photograph a tired Scarlet Tanager (below)
So we headed over to the Birding and Nature Center, where most of the reported goodies were being found right in the parking lot! In addition to tons of Tennessee Warblers, the Cape May Warbler had apparently migrated over from the Convention Centre bottlebrush tree to the “Orange Tree” that Javi, the resident naturalist, had created out of a freeze-killed Sea Grape tree! A Green Heron was hanging around the big waterfall, and Javi himself found us a Bullock’s Oriole in Songbird Alley! We took a quick look at the “free” end of the boardwalk, where a Black-throated Green Warbler was hiding from the wind near the nursery, but that was about it.
A dead Sea Grape tree makes for a handy place to stick oranges!
We still had time, so Annu was certainly game to go back to the Convention Centre, so I dropped her off at the entrance (figures that the bus would pull up behind me as I was doing that L), then parked in my usual spot at the “top” of the Circular Area and weaved around the “maze” there (Arun had opted to stay in the car and take a nap J), but only picked up the two “dirty” young White Ibis. Annu was in Heaven again as she had found another Painted Bunting and was sitting with him, so I hung at the water feature and enjoyed an Ovenbird, Northern Waterthrush, and Worm-eating Warbler, plus the Buff-bellied Hummer. But the big surprise was another junco that came in for a drink! (Several people suspected there were actually two birds, because the “back yard” bird and the “water feature” bird were being seen almost simultaneously!
We finally had to tear ourselves away from there, ending the day with 76 species (which isn’t bad considering we virtually avoided the water birds)! Bird list:
Black-bellied
Whistling-Duck
Mottled
Duck
Redhead
Rock
Pigeon
Ruby-throated
Hummingbird
Buff-bellied
Hummingbird
Sora
American
Coot
Purple
Gallinule
Black-necked
Stilt
Stilt
Sandpiper
Pectoral
Sandpiper
Spotted
Sandpiper
Greater
Yellowlegs
Willet
Laughing
Gull
Franklin's
Gull
Caspian
Tern
Royal
Tern
Least
Tern
Black
Skimmer
Brown
Pelican
Least
Bittern
Great
Egret
Snowy
Egret
Cattle
Egret
Green
Heron
White
Ibis
Yellow-bellied
Sapsucker
Golden-fronted
Woodpecker
Eastern
Wood-Pewee
Great
Kiskadee
Tropical
Kingbird
Eastern
Kingbird
White-eyed
Vireo
Barn
Swallow
Marsh
Wren
Gray
Catbird
Northern
Mockingbird
Gray-cheeked
Thrush
Swainson's
Thrush
Wood
Thrush
House
Sparrow
Chipping
Sparrow
Clay-colored
Sparrow
Dark-eyed
Junco
Savannah
Sparrow
Lincoln's
Sparrow
Yellow-breasted
Chat
Yellow-headed
Blackbird
Orchard
Oriole
Bullock's
Oriole
Baltimore
Oriole
Red-winged
Blackbird
Brown-headed
Cowbird
Great-tailed
Grackle
Ovenbird
Worm-eating
Warbler
Northern
Waterthrush
Black-and-white
Warbler
Tennessee
Warbler
Nashville
Warbler
Kentucky
Warbler
Common
Yellowthroat
Hooded
Warbler
American
Redstart
Cape
May Warbler
Northern
Parula
Yellow
Warbler
Black-throated
Green Warbler
Wilson's
Warbler
Summer
Tanager
Scarlet
Tanager
Rose-breasted
Grosbeak
Indigo
Bunting
Painted
Bunting
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