Where the Birds Are

.....can be found at
http://www.pbase.com/stormpetrels

Heres the trip report from our trip through south Texas over Presidents Day Weekend from Thrusday the 17th to Tuesday the 22nd.

We started out the morning of the 18th driving down to the King Ranch from Corpus Christi for a half day tour through the Laureles (spelling?) section of the ranch. The guide, Tom Langschied, was an excellent guide and a very skilled birder and managed to find us many of our target species for the day. Almost immediately after entering the Laureles Division we came across two Sprague’s Pipits a good 10-15 feet from the car providing excellent views. Next we came across a small man made mound that a pair of Burrowing Owls have roosted in all winter, sure enough both owls were there and gave us some great looks. The rest of the day went smoothly and we had excellent views of White-tailed Hawks (both juveniles and adults) and some stunning White-tailed Kites. We had good numbers of waterfowl and herons as well as flocks (!) of meadowlarks, something alien to me up here in Michigan. A small group of Brewer’s Blackbirds was a nice find and the shear numbers of raptors in the area was just fantastic. All in all it was a great tour and I highly recommend it to anyone, as it was interesting and we picked up a good number of specialties. Unfortunately the wind kept down the LeConte’s Sparrows as well as the Cave Swallows and the Ferruginous Hawk never did appear, but that just leaves a reason to come back.

 

The last part of this day was spent at Cannon Road hoping to find the Roadside Hawk that had been seen on and off, unfortunately it never did appear. Not many other birds were present, although we had our first Tropical Kingbird of the trip. That evening we picked up another young birder from Houston who I had met in Arizona and went to where we would stay for the next three nights at Casa Santa Ana. I’d like to just take a moment to talk about how amazing Casa Santa Ana was, because I very highly recommend it to anyone visiting the valley. It is run by birders, for birders and is close enough to Santa Ana to be able to walk to it. The owners were very accommodating and always willing to help with any information we needed. The rooms were very comfortable (especially compared to a motel rooms) and a morning breakfast was also included. They had feeding stations which attracted lots of good birds and each night we fell asleep to Pauraques calling outside the window, which is very cool in my opinion. We thoroughly enjoyed our stay there and I do not think that we could have chosen a better place to stay. Website is- http://www.casasantaana.com/

 

The next morning we woke to a Buff-bellied Hummingbird just outside our room’s door and warblers flitting in the thickets along the fence. While Chris stayed back at the feeders to photograph the birds, my mom and I walked to Santa Ana. We quickly picked up lots of the more common valley specialties and headed first to the parking lot. Long-billed Thrashers were flitting around low on the largest island and Clay-colored Robin seemed to be the most common bird present. A large group of birders were hanging around the island and as we walked up we heard a shout of “WHITE THROATED ROBIN!!!” And everyone headed to the end of the island, which of course made the bird flush across into the thick woods leaving only a few people with looks at the bird. After searching unsuccessfully for it to reappear we headed off to the trails around Santa Ana. We spent time with a guide from the nature center and found Least Grebes on the back ponds and got some great views of the Lesser Nighthawk that has been roosting at the same spot all winter. Certainly a highlight and a surprise was a Tropical Parula moving with a small warbler flock on our way to Pintail Lakes. Not many birds for the remainder of the morning until around noon or so we saw two Rose-throated Becards near Pintail Lakes on the C trail.

 

We finished up at Santa Ana, picked up Chris, and headed out to Frontera. I especially enjoyed Frontera and we saw a number of good species there. We immediately went to where the White-throated Robin has been seen and within seconds of arriving we saw the bird. After looking unsuccessfully for the trogon and the anis (both had been seen in the morning….and after we left) we headed towards the feeders where we had some excellent views of a male Crimson-collared Grosbeak when it sat in the trees adjacent to the feeders (the mockingbird usually chased him away when he came to the feeders). Once we finished up there we were not certain on what we would do for the rest of the day. Just on a hunch we decided to head over to Santa Ana, which turned out to be a good idea.

 

We arrived when the visitor center had already closed for the day and nearly all the birders had left. We headed out towards Pintail Lakes and quickly found that there were hordes of Cave Swallows flying around above our heads. Pierre Howard was still out waiting with Steve Holzman (did I get that name right?) waiting for a Hook-billed Kite to come by with no success. A large number of dowitchers and stilts were in at Pintail lakes as well as a lone winter plumaged avocet. We really didn’t have much idea of where to go, but we dimly hoped we might run into the Roadside Hawk that had been seen a couple times (most recently by Pierre the day before). Just on another hunch we headed down the C trail for no particular reason. It appeared as though that was not such a good idea as we saw NO birds whatsoever for most of our walk along the Rio Grande. Just as we were starting to think more about dinner then birds we noticed a small flock of people coming down towards us. As I bent down to tie my shoe Chris said that he had something hawk like fly across the road right in front of the kids. Immediately we were paying attention, and Roadside Hawk was going through both our heads I’m sure. We reached the spot where Chris had seen this….turned to the left….and right there off the trail was a juvenile Roadside Hawk staring back at us from about 20 feet away. Immediately I knew that no one would believe us, as this bird has not been seen with any consistently and had not been confirmed, so we focused mostly on trying to get pictures. All the time we were hooting and howling, while the other people just walked by shaking their heads. I still couldn’t believe how incredibly lucky we were to have come across that bird and it was an awesome looking bird at that (not to mention saving my mom from driving to San Ygnacio). We finished up the day with Pauraque’s calling in the driveway.

 

Next day we woke up bright and early to reach Salineno early in the morning. The DeWind’s feeders were active and we quickly had two oriole species and lots of other good feeder birds. Our main target here was Brown Jay, which we ended up having to wait for nearly 3 hours (as we were leaving….) for them to show up. Also had one Hooded Oriole later in the morning. We found out later that Chapeno had been fairly active that morning with Brown Jays, Red-billed Pigeons, Green Kingfisher, and even a Muscovy Duck. We headed out there next and found it to be rather unproductive with nothing particularly special that we hadn’t had elsewhere. It would seem as though an early morning visit would have been more productive for us to have picked up those target species and I would recommend that for anyone else visiting. All in all we ended up missing more targets then we saw, but needless to say both spots were interesting in their selves. Before we dropped Chris off at the airport to head back to Houston, we made a quick stop at Bentsen State Park, which we found to be quite a disappointment from all of the grand stories we had heard of it.

 

That evening I was brought out by John, an owner of Casa Santa Ana, to try to spotlight some Pauraques. I was not disappointed. After driving some back roads for 10 or 15 minutes we came across one sitting just off the right side of the road. We got out of the car and literally walked right up to the bird, a fantastic experience.

 

Monday was our last day, but also one of the most productive. I managed to convince my mom to get up bright and early to reach Sabal Palms at 7am when they open to hit the Gray-crowned Yellowthroat at the ideal time. I managed to mess up that plan by accidentally throwing away the keys, making us arrive at about 7:30 (after what seems to be the desired time to see the bird). Many other birders were present, but the bird had not yet shown itself. A number of Common Yellowthroats were present and there was one particular yellowthroat that was hanging out in the area that the gray-crowned usual hangs out. It was thought by many of the people that this was “the” yellowthroat, despite its sounding nearly identical to the other yellowthroats. Unfortunately the bird was low and far back, and no one could get on the bird, so we really had no idea if it was the gray-crowned or not. I found it interesting that if this was the gray-crowned, then why was it singing a commons song? One explanation was that the bird had been there the year before as a young male with its own song, but ended up mimicking the commons song just from being there. After about 2 hours of carefully watching for the bird to pop up, one of the Victor Emanuel guides got it in the scope. Only a handful of people got to see it in the scope, but at least at that point we knew that it was “the” bird. After searching unsuccessfully for the next ten minutes or so another VENT guide spotted the bird in the large round tree and most people (including me) had an excellent brief view of it in the open. While waiting for it to come in, I spotted two Groove-billed Anis as they flew in from behind and quickly disappeared into the grass, mouse like in how the managed to just disappear. We then wondered off and thought about going towards where the Blue Bunting had been seen, but we opted to go off the other direction. It wasn’t until we got home did we hear about the bunting being seen as well as a pair of Golden-cheeked Warblers……….

 

Our next stop was at the UTB campus site for the Golden-crowned Warbler. Shortly after arriving someone said that it had just been seen off in the woods on the right. We quickly went over there, but it turned out to just be a (common) yellowthroat. While they stuck around in that area I decided to wonder off to the left side of the dike just on a hunch. I flushed up a Pauraque and also noticed a small warbler feeding flock feeding near the pond. Wondering over in that direction I kept an eye on the lowest birds and quickly picked out one that seemed not to really be part of the general flock. Once I got close enough I could see that it was indeed the Golden-crowned Warbler…and it was singing. After getting to watch it for a couple minutes by myself I managed to call another birder over, which in turn gathered more birders, and eventually gathered quite a crowd, especially including the VENT group. Also had our first Couch’s Kingbird of the trip at that location. After we left the campus site we went out on Boca Chica blvd and had very distant looks at an Aplomado Falcon.

 

 For the last leg of the trip we hit the Ranch at El Canelo on our way back to Corpus for our flight. This was very much worth the entrance fee and I highly recommend visiting here. Once again as in King Ranch, the bird life was incredible and we had some great views of a number of less common species. Incredibly, as we drove in we noticed a juvenile Common Black-hawk near the ponds…..right off the side of the road! It was incredible, and quite a sight to see. Our main target here was the Ferruginous Pygmy Owl, which turned out to put on quite a show. As soon as we pulled up to the ranch house and knocked, Monica (who runs the ranch) came out and said a female has been in the tree right next to the door. Sure enough, there she was, sitting up with a rodent in her talons giving us the most incredible looks. Monica mentioned that it had been sitting up in the tree for about 3 hours with that rodent in its talons, but not eating. I jokingly mentioned that it had been waiting for us to show up and sure enough (after my mom and Monica went inside though) it started going at the rodent.
It put on quite a show, even coughing up a pellet as I watched it, which we found….apparently only the 2^nd Monica has found in 9 years. Coming to the ranch as the last part of the trip was an excellent way to end the trip, as the bird life was just everywhere. On our way out a bobwhite ran across the road while we watched a Great-horned Owl at a nest while White-tailed Hawks and caracaras flew around in the air and Grasshopper Sparrows called from the grasses. As we were about to leave the ranch we made a quick stop in the shorter fields, where we had excellent views of a male Vermillion Flycatcher and a single Sprague’s Pipit.

 

Altogether the trip was amazing and we saw loads of incredible birds. The final tally for the trip was 153 species with 33 lifers, not a bad count in my opinion.