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Published: April 3rd 2021
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Here’s the wrap up for our birding adventure to South Texas. It was well worth it! Our visit added 47 to our “Big Year” list – and just over 100 in total for the adventure.
We had to return the car by 1 pm, which was unfortunate, as our flight didn’t leave till 4+, but we had plenty of time to return to the very first Hotspot we visited in Harlingen before, eager to snap our most elusive bird – the small Green Kingfisher. Nope. It remains a challenge for the future.
In fact, that place felt much more deserted of birds than that first visit – tho we got up to 11 species eventually. The find of the day was the JAVELINA!! He was slurping up the seed under the feeder with great abandon.
For those who care, these are most of the birds we found in Texas, with * marked on ones we’d seen before but not this year – all others are new to our “life list.” And we were told that April is the REAL month to go to Texas – as the warblers pass through and some are not going to Ohio, but
further west. Oh my.
Curve-billed thrasher
Long-billed thrasher
Clay-colored thrush
Louisiana Waterthrush
Orange-crowned warbler
Orioles: Altamira, Hooded, and Orchard*
Green
Black-crowned titmouse
Great-tailed grackle
Least & pied-billed* grebes
Buff-bellied, ruby-throated* and black-chinned hummers
Inca & white-tipped doves
Lincoln’s and olive sparrows
Great kiskadee
Bronzed cowbird
Neotropic & double-crested* cormorants
White-eyed vireo*
Vermilion fly-catcher
Ladder-backed and gold-fronted woodpeckers
White-faced ibis
Cinnamon teal
Red-crowned & Red-lored parrots
Spotted sandpiper at last
Least bittern
Verdin
White tailed kite & Harris hawks
Scissor-tailed flycatcher
Tropical and Couches kingbirds
Chihuahuan raven
Crested caracara* (lots in Aruba)
Chachalacas galore!
The Elegant Trogon !!! a magnificent bird who shouldn’t have been there
Yellow-faced grassquit – which is evidently quite a find
Of course there were also lots of species we’d already seen this year in Ohio or Florida (esp the shore birds).
We met many people from MN & WI, MI and OH, who said they preferred wintering in the Valley because Florida is too crowded. We agree that if
you are on the single-road into the Keys, or anywhere near Ft. Lauderdale, the traffic is like a racetrack, and very scary. We saw pretty good driving on the motorways, unlike in FL.
In fact, we were able to stay off the interstate most of the time and found long, straight, interesting roads. The Military Road in particular had many historical markers to do with Texas independence and Civil War battles. We were within a mile of the Rio Grande lots of time.
Another interesting thing was the naming of the roads. In Ohio we are used to CR (county road) or TR (township road), but in TX we saw Fm 151, Fm 242, etc. That’s “Farm to market road.” Developing the irrigation systems, and then how to take out the abundance of this area really changed the land. And evidently the “cattle drives” we all know and love only took place for about 20 years, before the Railroads arrived.
We're just going to post some pretty birds as a last hurrah. for those of you not familiar with Travelblog - you need need to do a little searching for all the 13 photos we've uploaded this
time.
Thanks for being interested.
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