Lots of birds in the Zooming slide show this month – from the Whooping Crane Festival in south Texas as well as Josey Ranch (Carrollton TX), the Springfield Botanical Gardens (Springfield MO) and Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge (near Sherman TX). I find myself picking images that show bird behavior rather than portraits.
There are spring flowers in this collection as well…more of those coming in April!
Enjoy the March 2024 slide show!
My March visit to Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge was on my way home the day after my mother’s funeral in Dallas. I needed the healing of being out in a natural place like Hagerman. There were the usual male red-wing blackbirds proclaiming spring and their territory. Several times I could see males spaced out over the landscape…a visible cue for the size of their territories.
There were American wigeon, gadwalls, northern pintails, and American coots on the water in small numbers. A neotropic cormorant was enjoying the warming sun on its wings. Some birds had probably already headed north.
There was a group of 2 great blue herons and a great egret in sentry mode. They must have already had their breakfast because they didn’t move while I was watching.
A vocal cardinal perched in a tree near the road.
I had two favorite birds of the morning: a killdeer that was posturing in a field just as started down the wildlife loop road (it looked like it was signaling something…but I don’t know what) and
A female common goldeneye…the first I had seen at Hagerman. This bird would certainly be moving north soon since most of their breeding area is in Canada and Alaska!
I continued home…glad that I had made the effort to photograph birds at Hagerman.
We signed up for a shorebird identification field trip for the third afternoon of the Whooping Crane Festival. We got on the bus after lunch and, it turned out, spent the whole session at Leonabelle Turnbull Birding Center…which was fine with us since we had wanted to return there. We spent less time with the guide and just enjoyed all the birds at the place. There is a lot to see; the boardwalk makes it easy to see birds without disturbing them. The shallows are a popular place for them to feel secure enough to rest and bathe…and snack.
American white pelicans – in a big group or singles.
The common gallinule was near the alligator (again). I decided to take close up views of the feet (very long toes).
A black necked stilt wondered along through other species…looking aloof.
The green-winged teals were bathing…preening.
Grackles were bathing and preening too….or making raucous noise in the reeds and glaring at my camera.
A pied-billed grebe wandered near the reeds…hiding in plain sight as usual. Once I noticed the bird, I took a series of pictures as it found lunch.
A northern shoveler snoozed…another perched on a post in the water.
Ibis preened and stretched their wings.
I took a series of images of a bird in the shallows…thoroughly cleaning its feathers. It takes a series of contortions. The bird appeared to be enjoying the water!
A blue-winged teal showed the blue on its wing when it bathed.
Now for some group pictures. They are good for size comparison and ID practice. The first has 2 black-necked stilts and a male northern shoveler.
The second had a black-necked stilt and 4 American avocets.
The smaller birds were easily startled and would explode up into air…circle and return very close to where they were before the panic.
There were neotropic cormorants seemingly content to just sit in the sun.
There was a tricolored heron that seemed to be posing for pictures. I couldn’t resist!
The alligator did not move at all in the several hours we were there!
Overall – the place lived up to my expectations; we could have done it on our own rather than with the bus/guide. I am beginning to understand better that we have learned enough about birding to leave more free time to during festivals…or go early/stay late.
The last field trip of the festival would be the next morning at Fennessey Ranch.
The first tour of the Whooping Crane Festival for us was a birding-by-boat tour of Mustang Island on our first afternoon in Port Aransas TX. It was a sunny day…perfect temperature for the tour. We saw cormorants as we left the dock area for the main channel.
The bird sightings included a first for us: the white morph of the reddish egret. They are distinguished from other white egrets/juvenile herons by the pink and black bill. We saw more white morphs than the usual more numerous dark morphs! One of the images has a little blue heron along with the white morph of the reddish egret…for size comparison.
A yellowlegs was searching for food in the shallows. It is hard to judge the size. Does the bill look long enough to be a greater yellowlegs? Not sure.
There seemed to be a lot of great blue herons as well. The wind was blowing enough to ruffle feathers.
A white ibis strolled near the shoreline.
A pelican on a post kept our boat in view.
A ring-billed gull was also enjoying the view from a post…did not seem as keen to turn as our boat moved past.
Turkey vultures were doing cleanup on a coyote carcass. There is some trash in the background. I try to avoid taking pictures of trash. The area was relatively clean, but trash is inevitable even in wild areas within water or wind distance of developed areas.
A little blue heron looked very intent on something in the water…ignoring our boat.
The osprey swooped in…and missed!
The cormorants with white outlining their yellow chin are neotropic cormorants. There was a group of them on a sandbar as we went by. Most of them stayed facing the sun but a few looked our way!
Port Aransas is on a barrier island with a ferry to cross the channel. Our tour boat went past the ferry crossing…a different perspective than when we were on the ferry in our car!
On the way back to the dock, we passed the jetty again with gulls and pelicans….and a royal tern.
Tomorrow’s post is about the sunset dolphin cruise that was the finale of our first day at the Whooping Crane Festival.
It was a very hot day when I made the road trip from Missouri to Texas in September. It was over 90 degrees when I made the exit to go to Hagerman – thinking that maybe the government would shut down before I headed home, and I wasn’t sure if the refuge would be accessible then.
There were a few migrants at the refuge that I hadn’t seen since last spring: White-faced Ibis,
Neotropic Cormorants (evidently this bird is expanding its range), and
I didn’t see any of the migratory ducks…maybe they will be there next month,
There were the usual egrets and herons. A snowy egret strutted in the shallows.
Several of the great blue herons looked like juveniles.
Some of the egrets (great and snowy) and a great blue heron were enjoying feeding in grassy areas that had been flooded.
I saw a snag with at least 8 white birds in it.
I zoomed in to take as many pictures as I could of individual birds. There were snowy egrets,
Cattle egrets, and
A juvenile little blue heron!
A great blue heron and great egret were on a snag in the water – the heron had just gotten a fish….the egret looks on.
Hagerman was ready for more birds that were probably coming soon in increasing numbers…and some will stay for the winter. Hopefully I will see more of them when I go in October.
Tomorrow’s post will focus on the non-bird sightings at Hagerman in September.
The last day of birding at the Laredo Birding Festival started with the van leaving the hotel at 6 AM! It was the earliest start of the festival, but we were accustomed to it by that time. The front of the hotel was alive with activity in the darkness.
Our destination was the La Perla Ranch, prized for its habitat and plentiful birds that thrive near its sensational water features. They had the name of the place on the chairs at the hunting lodge!
The first bird of the morning was a Great Horned Owl on an antennae. What a great start to the day of birding! The bird seemed to be very scrutinizing our van breaking the calm of the morning.
The sun was not quite above the horizon yet…I got a silhouette of a Crested Caracara through a fence. The bird has a very distinctive profile.
And then we arrived at the hunting lodge the ranch provides…the sun came up. I liked the ‘barn’ birdfeeder in one of the trees.
A Turkey Vulture sat hunched in the top of a palm. Others were soring overhead. Some wild turkey moved rapidly our of my camera range…I missed photographing them entirely.
There were quite a few Meadowlarks although almost out of range of my camera’s zoom. This is an area where the Eastern and Western Meadowlarks overlap. They have such minor distinguishing characteristics; I’m just saying the bird in this photo is a Meadowlark.
We did some walking around ponds. Most of the birds were far away. Pied-billed Grebe are easy to distinguish from the Least Grebe (we saw both). My photo is of a Pied-Billed Grebe because it has dark eyes.
Just barely within the range of my zoom: a Green Kingfisher. The area south Texas along the Rio Grand is the only place to see this bird in the US. This one is female.
Cinnamon Teal were also on the ponds. The coloring of the male is indeed ‘cinnamon’!
I didn’t get a great picture – but was thrilled to see and get a photo of Peregrine Falcon. All the other ones I’ve photographed were on man-made structures (like bridges).
Sometimes I just paused and looked around at the ranch – glistening water surrounded by dry areas… wildflowers. It was a wonderful place to spend the day.
A Belted Kingfisher (female) surveyed the water from a dock on one of the ponds. We had seen a Ringed Kingfisher earlier on one of the larger ponds but I didn’t get a picture; I was surprised at how large it was.
How many birds can you identify in this picture?
The largest white bird is a Great Egret The smaller ones are Snowy Egrets. There are two types of cormorants: the Neotropic Cormorants are the smaller and darker ones; the larger and lighter ones are the Double-crested Cormorants. In the foreground are Ruddy Ducks with their tails pointing upward.
For the last picture of the day – a parade of Egrets (the Great Egret bringing up the rear)!
Copyright © 2024, Gwen Morrison. All rights reserved.
Celebrating the whole of life....
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Copyright © 2024, Gwen Morrison. All rights reserved.
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