12/13/21
Curtis and Kathy were down from Montana working on their year list (or as Kathy made clear, his year list, as she just enjoyed seeing the birds J), so the original plan was to do Estero Llano Grande for the Valley stuff and inland water birds, then road-bird the La Sal del Rey area, but no one counted on it being a wet, misty morning! L So we switched the order and decided to road-bird first, heading up FM 493. Passing what my friend Pat calls the Halloween Pond (because it’s filled with creepy-looking dead trees), a raptor I assumed to be the resident Harris’ Hawk at first turned out to be a handsome Peregrine Falcon!
Continuing
to Hargill we made the left on FM 490, then right when we came to
Brushline. Right away we picked up a
Kiskadee, and Pyrrhuloxias were a lot easier to bag this time than with the
sisters last week (probably because Curtis and Kathy already had them for the
year from Arizona…)! A Caracara flew
across the road right away, and a few Lark Sparrows hid in the middle of a tree
while they chattered and snorted. Further
down we were finally able to draw out an Olive Sparrow, and a Cooper’s Hawk sat
nicely by the road, along with several Loggerhead Shrikes. A Pyrrhuloxia and two Curve-billed Thrashers
fed along the side of the road, and one wetland we came across had several
Black-bellied Whistling Ducks, along with a Great Egret, Great Blue Heron, and
a few Sandhill Cranes across the way.
Somewhere along here I heard a Bobwhite in the distance, but way too far
away to see, of course.
Curt and Kathy at the foot of Brushline Road
Cooper's Hawk
Loggerhead Shrike
Towards
the north end we flushed several Savannah Sparrows, and at another flooded
field just before SR 186 we found more cranes, several Killdeer, and a few
Lesser Yellowlegs. Curt got on something
he didn’t recognize, and when I finally found it, it turned out to be a
Black-bellied Plover, rather rare inland!
The single Long-billed Dowitcher almost got overlooked!
Savannah Sparrow
Things
quieted down on the other side of the highway; after we made the turn onto Ken
Baker Drive, a couple of Lincoln’s Sparrows finally decided to show themselves
(along with the needed House Wren), and once the mist finally quit, we were
able to get out of the car on occasion and try to track some things down. A Bewick’s Wren popped up while we were
trying to call in something else, and a pair of Long-billed Thrashers played
hide-and-seek. Curt spotted a Roadrunner
near the fenceline, and a gorgeous White-tailed Hawk stared down at us from his
power pole! More raptors started
circling, and in addition to the standard TVs we added a couple of Black
Vultures, Harriers, and a Fuertes’ Red-tailed Hawk among the other Redtails! Kathy spotted a distant ballet of White
Pelicans in with the vultures, which was pretty neat! One of the funniest sights was a
Ladder-backed Woodpecker on the wire! We
tried and tried to get a singing White-eyed Vireo to come out, but the only
thing to respond was a Ruby-crowned Kinglet…
Kathy and Curt on North Brushline Road
Crested Caracara
Lincoln's Sparrow
House Wren
White-tailed Hawk - front view
We
headed into the Rio Beef Feedyards in hopes of bagging a Ross’ Goose in with
the Snows that hung around in there, picking up several Long-billed Curlews in
the fields. Procuring permission, we
headed towards the western end, but not before checking out the icterid mob –
in addition to the expected Red-winged Blackbirds, we had tons of Brown-headed
Cowbirds, a couple of Bronzed (which they needed) and the flaggable but always-there Brewer’s Blackbirds (which they didn’t need J)! We spotted a couple dozen Snow Geese in the
far pen pretty close to the road, so we slowly crept up in the car, and sure
enough, there was one pretty little Ross’ in with them! The “Blue Geese” were pretty cool to see as
well! Most of the geese were in a large
pond beyond the feed lot, along with lots of Shovelers and a few Black-necked
Stilts.
Yet another White-tailed Hawk going into the feed lots
Brewer's Blackbirds
White morph Snow Geese - note the black "grin line" and the curvature of the bill at the "cheek".
After finally getting turned around we rolled back out, adding Collared and Mourning Doves, and another beautiful Peregrine making the rounds (boy, did the Kestrel look tiny J)! We decided to hurry on from there in order to spend quality time at Estero, especially now that the sun had come out and it had turned into a gorgeous day, picking up two Double-crested Cormorants as we passed Delta Lake!
Once
in the parking lot an Orange-crowned Warbler came in close but wouldn’t let us
get a good look L, so we headed to the visitor’s center to
check in and pad the list with the waterfowl; lots more Black-bellied Whistling
Ducks were out there (along with their namesake White Ibis), but we couldn’t
find the Fulvous (nor the hybrid we had last week). We added several Shovelers, Mottled Ducks,
and a Pied-billed Grebe. Walking over to
the boardwalk Kathy spotted some Chachalacas hiding in the undergrowth, then
Curt and I quickly checked out Avocet Pond; unfortunately he missed the Least
Grebe that dove before he could get on it, then came up way over in the reeds…
Sandy and Curt in Estero's parking lot
From there we took the shortcut through the Camp Host area to the Tropical Zone, scaring what I assumed was a Ribbon Snake into hiding under a truck! Troy Hibbitts got back to me and said it was actually a Texas Patchnose Snake (and indeed, the two are very similar)! From there we went straight over to “Pam’s Palm” to see if we could find the McCall’s Screech Owl, and this time was much easier than last week; there “she” was, out in the open! The next challenge was “Burney the Pauraque”, and thankfully we ran into another park host who knew exactly where he was! Good thing, too, because he was on the opposite side of where he was last week, and I might not have found him!
From there we headed into the blind, where it was quite active to start: right away Curt and Kathy got their Green Jays (we had some playing hard-to-get at the entrance), and the Black-crested Titmice also gave better views than the overhead looks we got where the park host walked up! Curt had been missing every Blue-gray Gnatcatcher we came upon, and the one in the blind was no exception! L I had been hearing Buff-bellied Hummingbirds rattling all around us, and finally one came in to the feeder! A female Archilochus type also came in, but she didn’t land long enough to get a look at her outer primary so we could pin an ID on her… Kiskadees were all over, of course, along with a gorgeous Cardinal (something else they don’t get in Montana), and an Altamira Oriole called unseen, but after waiting 45 minutes no White-tipped Dove or Clay-colored Thrushes came in, so we decided to call it quits (but not before Kathy spotted a White-winged Dove waiting patiently in the wings).
We left a little early to see if we could find that Say’s Phoebe that had been reported at the old Progresso Sod Farms (now being developed for BIIIIG homes), but we only picked up both meadowlarks instead (plus the only Starlings of the day). It turned out not to be a bad excursion, with 71 species for the day! Bird list:
Black-bellied
Whistling-Duck
Snow
Goose
Ross's
Goose
Northern
Shoveler
Mottled
Duck
Plain
Chachalaca
Northern
Bobwhite
Least
Grebe
Pied-billed
Grebe
Eurasian
Collared-Dove
White-winged
Dove
Mourning
Dove
Greater
Roadrunner
Common
Pauraque
Buff-bellied
Hummingbird
Sora
Sandhill
Crane
Black-necked
Stilt
Black-bellied
Plover
Killdeer
Long-billed
Curlew
Long-billed
Dowitcher
Lesser
Yellowlegs
Double-crested
Cormorant
American
White Pelican
Great
Blue Heron
Great
Egret
White
Ibis
Black
Vulture
Turkey
Vulture
Northern
Harrier
Cooper's
Hawk
Harris's
Hawk
White-tailed
Hawk
Red-tailed
Hawk
Eastern
Screech-Owl
Golden-fronted
Woodpecker
Ladder-backed
Woodpecker
Crested
Caracara
American
Kestrel
Peregrine
Falcon
Great
Kiskadee
White-eyed
Vireo
Loggerhead
Shrike
Green
Jay
Black-crested
Titmouse
Horned
Lark
Ruby-crowned
Kinglet
Blue-gray
Gnatcatcher
House
Wren
Bewick's
Wren
European
Starling
Curve-billed
Thrasher
Long-billed
Thrasher
Northern
Mockingbird
House
Sparrow
Olive
Sparrow
Lark
Sparrow
Savannah
Sparrow
Lincoln's
Sparrow
Western
Meadowlark
Eastern
Meadowlark
Altamira
Oriole
Red-winged
Blackbird
Bronzed
Cowbird
Brown-headed
Cowbird
Brewer's
Blackbird
Great-tailed
Grackle
Orange-crowned
Warbler
Northern
Cardinal
Pyrrhuloxia
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