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January 1-26
(written for Fort Worth Audubon newsletter). It’s
hard to believe it, but I’m doing something even more obsessive and crazy than my 2005 Texas big year of birding. I’m
doing an ABA big year—which means that I am trying to see as many bird species in the continental US and Canada in one
year as I can.
So far it’s been great fun,
with only a few big misses. I began the year doing a big day on January 1 with 4 women birders from Rockport (where my husband
and I were vacationing). We got 101 species, a great start. Among the expected coastal species that we saw were Brown and
American White Pelican, ducks including Common Goldeneye, all sorts of egrets and herons, and all of the Texas grackles. After
that Debra Corpora from Rockport and I went to the lower Rio Grande Valley for 3 days to find as many of the valley specialties
as we could—such as Olive Sparrow, Plain Chachalaca, Green Parakeet, Ringed and Green Kingfisher, Groove-billed Ani,
Northern Beardless-Tyrannulet, Common Pauraque, and Clay-colored Robin, plus the rare Dusky-capped Flycatcher being seen at
Sabal Palm sanctuary. And of course we went to Aransas NWR for the Whooping Cranes.
After a day in Fort Worth and a quick trip to see the Short-eared Owls on Winscott-Plover
Road and a few other local north Texas birds, Jerri Kerr from Plano joined me on a trip to Minnesota, where we were able to
see Snowy, Great Gray and Northern Hawk-Owls, Black-backed and American Three-toed Woodpeckers, displaying Sharp-tailed Grouse,
Black-capped and Boreal Chickadees, Northern Shrikes, Bohemian Waxwings, a Varied Thrush, Pine and Evening Grosbeaks, Snow
Buntings, Common and Hoary Redpolls, and Red and White-winged Crossbills.
After a two-day stand and fanatic client work in Fort Worth, I hopped in my car on January 14th and began my
4300-mile solo trip to and from Morro Bay, California by way of two stops in Madera Canyon, Arizona, for some rarities reported
there and a stop on my return trip at Sandia Crest in New Mexico for the three species of rosy-finches. South-east Arizona
allowed me to see my lifer Aztec Thrush and my first ABA-area Crescent-chested Warbler (after three hikes up the Old Baldy
Trail in Madera Canyon), plus a lovely Rufous-backed Robin in Tucson and a Northern Jacana outside of Phoenix.
My western trip was timed to allow me to participate in a birding
festival in Morro Bay, including a pelagic trip there. It was an excellent festival, and allowed me to increase my year’s
total by 56 species, including various western cormorants, gulls and shorebirds as well as Marbled Murrelets, Rhinoceros Auklets,
Black-vented, Short-tailed, Pink-footed and Sooty Shearwaters, and Northern Fulmars. On land I also had wonderful views of
Yellow-billed Magpies, as well as other California specialties.
And the misses—they include the Ruff that would not show for me in Arizona, although others saw it when I wasn’t
there, and the birds that I haven’t chased because I could only be one place at a time. It’s a hard lesson to
learn, but the best lesson I’ve learned is that I sure do love to go birding. Even after doing it almost non-stop for
a month. Only 11 months left.
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through Feb. 27th (written
for Fort Worth Audubon newsletter)
This will need to be a whirlwind summary of my last month’s big year adventures,
as I’m off to Oregon in a couple of hours. February started with a couple of local forays, for Rusty Blackbirds (Johnson
Co.), American Woodcock and Brown Thrasher (Western Oaks off Lake Worth), and Eastern Screech-Owl (park off Memorial Oaks).
I then ventured farther afield to Hagerman NWR for Purple Finches and Red-headed Woodpecker. It turns out that I need not
have searched for Purple Finches—they were almost common on my unsuccessful eastward trek to look for Smith’s
Longspur.
The highlight of the month was the
White-crested Elaenia on South Padre Island. Some type of elaenia had been reported down there, and I knew whatever it was,
I really wanted it for my big year list. So for I think for the first time in my life, I made a solo, all-night drive to SPI,
where Gail Morris, Ann Hoover and Jerri Kerr (from Plano) met me, also having driven all night. Shortly after dawn, we all
saw the cute little flitty flycatcher with its bright white top-knot. It’s good we went when we did, because after that
day, it was never seen again.
My big trip of the month was to
go east for a North Carolina pelagic trip, followed by Florida birding and another pelagic off Delaware. Ann Hoover joined
me for the NC portion of the trip, where we found many Great Black-backed Gulls and Black Ducks, a single Great Cormorant
and a single Purple Sandpiper. On the pelagic trip, the highlight was the Great Skua and the Dovekies. There were quite a
few Razorbills and Red Phalaropes and couple of distant Manx Shearwaters.
For the Florida portion of the trip, I was very lucky in that a Bananaquit had been discovered in Fort Lauderdale just before
I was due to arrive in Miami, and within a couple of hours of landing I was seeing the cute little black, white and yellow
bird stick its beak in the flowers of a bottle-brush tree! With the help of a local guide, I was able to locate most of the
Miami-area specialties, including the various now-established parakeets, the White-crowned Pigeon, Red-whiskered Bulbul, Spot-breasted
Oriole, Snail Kite, Short-tailed Hawk, Limpkin and Shiny Cowbird.
The Delaware portion of the trip looked like it was going to be
a bust as I was caught in East Brunswick, NJ in a heavy snow that eventually reached over 6 inches. I decided to abandon the
idea of the pelagic (which was really a relief) and instead try for the two rare geese being seen in NY and NJ. After a long
drive across Long Island, I spent most of the day not seeing the geese, and then went back west to try at another place where
a Pink-footed Goose had been seen. About an hour after I got to Stony Brook, a flock of geese, including the Pink-footed,
arrived, and the next morning, I scanned through a flock of geese in Califon, NJ and found the reported Barnacle Goose.
For the last few days, I’ve
been super-busy with client work, and of course, with laundry and re-packing for my Oregon trip. The species total so far
for the year is 395 (2/27).
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summary through March 26
At the end of February, I flew west to Oregon with Debra
Corpora from Rockport, TX in order to go on a pelagic trip and add some western birds to my year list. We explored the Oregon
coast for a couple of days, and were delighted to find Harlequin Ducks perched on rocks, pigeon guillemots easy to find in
the water and a Red-necked Grebe. We discovered Sweet Creek Trail near Florence, Oregon, and located two cute American Dippers
tucked away under some overhanging branches along the fast-rushing creek. Debra declined to go along on the pelagic trip itself,
but it was a great day, with highlights being numerous Black-footed and Laysan Albatrosses. When I disembarked from the boat,
Debra rushed me away in the twilight to see the Trumpeter Swan that she had found during the day. The next morning, she and
I drove to Washington state preparatory to our next day’s ferry ride to Vancouver Island. Once on the island, we saw
many Northwestern Crows and then hit the known spots for Sky Lark, and at the “daffodil fields” we found them
displaying around and above us. Mission accomplished, we took the ferry back to the US, tossed around as if we were on the
ocean in the very strong winds. The day after my return to Texas, I raced
over to Dallas where the Little Gull had again been reported. Even though it was raining, it was easy to see amid the Bonaparte’s
Gulls, it’s dark underwings visible almost without binoculars. My next trip was a “wild crane chase” to Nebraska where a Common Crane had been reported among the zillion
Sandhill Cranes that were gathering there. Because I had never witnessed the Nebraska crane spectacle, it was a worthwhile
trip, but it was a lot like looking for a needle in a haystack. Not successful in that, but I did locate a locale lek spot
in NE for Greater Prairie-Chickens and got a good view of one peering at me over the grasses. I then went east to visit the
Stuttgart, AR airport where Smith’s Longspurs winter. Most of them had apparently gone north, but I did find one lingering
on. After returning to Texas, I spent some time on long-needed
client work, and then, the call of the wild drew me to Sabine Pass, where Jana Whittle had discovered a Fork-tailed Flycatcher.
I saw it within about 25 minutes of my arrival there on Sunday March 16th, and then headed down the Texas coast
and south to bird the valley. It was too windy for much to be seen, but on the 18th, I checked to see if anything
was being seen at Allen Williams’ yard in Pharr and learned that he might have a White-throated Robin. I raced
over there, and lo and behold, that’s exactly what he had!! The second great Texas bird in two days! The next day was totally uneventful, with wind keeping all the birds hunkered down, and I
assumed that I probably had reached the end of the March excitement. But I kept checking the rare birds alerts and kept having
this nagging feeling about a bird that had been seen for months in Georgia, a Green-breasted Mango. I just couldn’t
decided whether I should gamble and go there, spending lots of money on last-minute airfare, with a good chance that the bird
would be gone by the time I got there. But finally, I bit the bullet, and on March 23, I flew to Atlanta, rented a car and
drove to Dublin, GA. Within 20 minutes of my arrival at the Jackson’s yard there, I saw the Mango, gorgeously large
and glowing blue and green. I saw it again the next morning before I headed out to explore Georgia, and added a couple more
southeastern birds that are also found in Texas but which I hadn’t yet seen for the year. So, at this writing (March 26), I’m at 434 species for the year. I’m planning
to go to Colorado and Florida, and of course, the Texas coast for migration, in April, so I’m looking forward to the
coming weeks. And I’m still enthusiastic and motivated (though I’ve gone through a few down times when things
were particularly slow). Mostly, it’s been fun!!
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