23-24 OCT 2015
My first “official” assignment as a
guide for Alamo Inn B&B was to accompany a naturalist/TV journalist from
Germany named Ina and her videographer Andreas on a quest to find
“flocks of birds” for a documentary TV show, spotlighting the Lower Rio Grande
Valley as a tourist destination, particularly for birding. They were here at the invitation of South
Texas Nature, an organization that is working to promote nature tourism here in
the LRGV to places not only in North America but in Europe as well. So we were hoping that this German team would
be impressed with what the Valley had to offer in the way of nature tourism!
However, nobody counted on Hurricane
Patricia arriving on the scene at the same time! L
They flew in Thursday night, and thankfully the rain that was predicted
for Friday stayed away for the most part, so I picked them up around 7:30
Friday morning and headed for Sabal Palm Sanctuary to shoot feeder birds and
waterbirds from the blind.
The lady on duty said the mosquitoes
were very “friendly”, so we sprayed up, packed a couple of Off Wipes, and
headed to the feeders after doing a couple of takes of Ina and myself coming
out of the Rabb House! I explained that
this was one of the last strongholds of the Sabal Palm, which used to occur all
along the Rio Grande here in the Valley.
After a few takes of us walking up on the platform, another volunteer
arrived with the morning vittles, and before long the Green Jays were attacking
the feeders! A lone White-tipped Dove
poked around down below, and a Buff-bellied Hummingbird buzzed around unseen,
but chattering up a storm.
Shooting Green Jays at the feeders
After that we headed to the blind (with
several more takes walking in and out of the structure; no wonder “extras” say
that acting for TV shows and movies is so tiring!) where several Black-bellied
Whistling Duck families swam around (and also came flying in), and Kiskadees
flopped around the dead trees. I was
impressed when Ina (a biologist but not a birder) said, “There’s a
kingfisher!” Sure enough, a Green
Kingfisher was perching on the same tree as the Kiskadee! (Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised, as
their Common Kingfisher is about the same size and shape…) Both Least and Pied-billed Grebes poked
around, and both Ina and Andreas were able to get nice views through the scope.
Black-bellied Whistling Ducks
View from the blind
What they were really hoping for,
however, were huge flocks of birds, which (granted) can be hit or miss,
especially this time of year (come back in about a month, and maybe we can find
some cranes and geese)! But we’d do our
best, so I thought maybe the famous Highway 48 Boat Ramp would come through
(and since it was overcast, the glare of the sun wouldn’t be a problem). The area’s signature bird (American
Oystercatcher) didn’t show, but right away three Black Skimmers went sailing
by, yelping as they went! There was a
sizeable flock of Laughing Gulls with a few skimmers on an island to the south,
but it was a ways out there. Ina got a
kick out of the fact that the white egret looking for breakfast was actually
called a Reddish Egret; I explained that they came in two color morphs! She also asked if the water was poisonous or
polluted, and I shrugged and said I didn’t think so. “Then why are there so many dead fish?” she
asked! I hadn’t even noticed all the
little perished bodies along the shoreline (guess it hadn’t started to stink
yet), but I explained that it was due to the “Red Tide”, a type of algae that
springs up occasionally and does a number on the fish population. To my knowledge, though, it doesn’t affect
the bird (or the human) population if they eat the fish.
Andreas shoots a distant flock of birds surrounded by victims of the Red Tide...
White morph Reddish Egret
Nydia (the South Texas Nature rep)
wanted to meet up with us at some point, so since it was getting close to lunch
time, Ina suggested we call her before heading to South Padre to give her time
to meet us somewhere. Keith wanted me to
take them to an “authentic” Tex-Mex place, and Nydia knew just the spot:
Manuel’s in Port Isabel! But first, we
had to “do” The Island in hopes of those big flocks, which we would often get
on the bayside access beach just north of the Convention Centre. Well.
We pulled in, and instead of being able to drive out onto a large
expanse of hard-packed beach and right up to lots of good birds, the water was
practically up to the little entrance shack!
Not a bird to be seen, except for an occasional Laughing Gull getting
out of the way of the many wind-surfers!
So since I didn’t want to keep Nydia waiting (she said it would take her
awhile to get there, anyway), we headed to the Birding Center, and that was
fun; while we didn’t encounter any “flocks”, we did have some nice birds, including calling Clapper Rails, my FOS
American Wigeon, and close-up Great Egrets and Little Blue and Tricolored
Herons. But the highlight was this big
mama Alligator just lounging on the spit, quietly watching this young Great
Blue Heron snoozing nearby, until it decided to take a walk over to where the
Alligator was, suddenly noticed it, and jumped and squawked! After an awkward standoff the heron finally
went back to its own spot.
Snoozing Great Blue Heron...
...and Alligator that was keeping an eye on him!
After a hike on the boardwalk we went up
to the top of the tower (which was my first time up there, actually) and got a
grand view of the whole area! I got a
kick out of the Rock Pigeon that was following everyone around like a lost
puppy, and finally hopped up on the table we were near; I even coaxed the thing
to sit on my hand! Made me wonder if it
was someone’s homing pigeon at one time…
I was disappointed that we didn’t at least get them a Roseate Spoonbill
or two – that would have been a hit for sure!
Filming the Alligator from the boardwalk
View from the top of the tower
Andreas and the Friendly Pigeon...
After showing them the water feature
that Arroyo Colorado Audubon had just made (and explained the importance of
these water features for migrating birds), we headed over to Port Isabel and
lunch with Nydia, which was a real treat: Manuel’s was a little
hole-in-the-wall northwest of the lighthouse, and the tradition was that you
were supposed to write something on the wall if it was your first time there
(only problem was that the wall was full J)! Discovered that one of Ina’s true passions is
tree houses (she had just come from Austin where some fabulous ones were on
display), so she was very interested in seeing the construction of the tree
tower at Santa Ana (which we were planning on visiting Saturday)!
She was also interested in shooting
some cattle on a ranch, so we made a last minute decision to go up to Rio Beef
(the only place I know of to see
cattle, guaranteed), and Nydia wanted to join us, so Ina rode with her and
Andreas came with me. We made a quick
stop at the “Highway 100 Resacas” in hopes of a bunch of shorebirds (nada), so
then hopped on the 77 and headed north. We
somehow got separated, but around Sebastian I noticed a bunch of cows and
Cattle Egrets right by the frontage road, so I went flying off the freeway and
back to where the cows were, and while Andreas dutifully filmed them I called
Nydia to tell her where we were, and that we didn’t have to go all the way to
Rio Beef – we found some cattle! When
they finally caught up with us, Ina confessed that what she had in mind was a
scene with the gate and the buildings and
the cattle (someone suggested later that she could have been thinking Texas
Longhorns), but sadly that kind of scene involves special arrangements with the
ranch; there’s noplace where you can just drive up and shoot a typical “Texas
Cattle Ranch” scene.
I think Nydia could feel Ina’s
disappointment, and since it was getting late, she suggested stopping at Estero
Llano Grande State Park (since the sun had actually come out, and “Estero never
disappoints” as Nydia said), and that was a great idea, seeing it was right on
the way to Alamo! When we got there the
staff was in the process of taking down the decorations for the planned “Spooky
Fest”, as Patricia had effectively canceled the event! But as I pointed out some of the birds to
Andreas (just a few coots and grebes at that point; I was hoping the vagrant
Purple Gallinule and/or the Jacana would show up for them), Nydia and Ina
headed out on the boardwalk and shortly ran into park host Huck Hutchins and
his bird walk! Next thing I knew, Nydia
was calling me to report that Huck had seen some Roseate Spoonbills up on the
levee! So we blasted out there, where
the spoonbills were nowhere to be found, but there was a huge flock of White Pelicans down the way, and when a red
pickup on the other side of the Estero Llano spooked a big portion of them,
they lifted off in a glorious pelican ballet!
Thankfully several stayed put, and about that time the blackbirds were
flocking as well, so we were all rejoicing that Ina and Andreas finally got
their “big flocks” of birds (and you can’t beat White Pelicans for a display of
beauty)! A pair of White-tailed Kites
added some excitement, but what should show up on the way back but the
spoonbills! That was the last thing
Andreas shot before heading back to the car (it was starting to drip), but
while we were blasting over the boardwalk to beat the rain, this dark “chicken”
with a white butt popped up out of the marsh – it was the immature Purple
Gallinule! Nydia was thrilled, and when
we got back to the deck, this young birding couple from Harlingen had been
waiting for an hour for the thing to show, and we flushed it for them! J
In return, they showed us the continuing Jacana, which Ina got to see
through their scope! As we hurried back
to the car, I explained that this is exactly one of the big draws of South
Texas: birders come not only for the specialty birds we have (of which we saw
many), but the vagrants that can show up at any time!
Nydia and Ina hit the boardwalk at Estero Llano Grande
A small part of the White Pelican Ballet!
The next day was an adventure of a
different type: the bulk of the Big Storm was supposed to hit, but by the time
I got to Ina’s suite it really wasn’t bad (just dripping), so we decided to try
Santa Ana after all so that she could see the tree tower and the canopy
walk. By the time we got there it had
actually quit spitting, and we were so engaged in sharing Costa Rica stories
that I completely forgot to bring my umbrella!
While it went from nothing to spitting to a light rain by the time we got
to the tower, before long the heavens opened and we were drenched! (Didn’t stop Ina from climbing to the top,
though… J) While huddled under the stairwell they asked
if I thought it would let up at all (the rain patterns around here often
consist of big dumps with breaks in between), but looking at the radar on my
IPhone (yes, I finally entered the 21st century…), we were in the
Green Blob (that was covering all of the Valley and parts of Mexico to boot) and
a Big Yellow Blob was coming our way, so we made a run for the parking
lot! (I told them at least I didn’t have
to take a shower now… J) We made it home fine, and after they dried
their clothes and packed I drove them to the airport in Harlingen, where we
went through torrential zero-visibility downpours and saw flooding along the
frontage roads in Weslaco of Biblical proportions (we all jumped when the
Weather Alert went off on all three of our phones simultaneously)! Thankfully everyone on the freeway was
driving sanely (at least where we were; Keith told me about a jackknifed truck
when he was taking another guest to
the airport) and we made it there in one piece, and I made it back in one piece!
What a story they’ll have to
tell, complete with the largest hurricane on record!
No comments:
Post a Comment