[texbirds] La Sal Viejas
- From: "" <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> (Redacted sender "MiriamEagl@xxxxxxx" for DMARC)
- To: texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 26 May 2014 16:54:40 -0400 (EDT)
Hi, all!
Finally drummed up the courage to tackle those dicey back roads going into
the La Sal Viejas tracts, and had just a marvelous time this morning! If
the roads are ABSOLUTELY DRY, then they should be perfectly passable so long
as you have a high-clearance vehicle to negotiate the ruts and "stuff"
growing in the middle! But the habitat was lovely and encountered all the
typical thornscrub birds (the route I took is described in the EBird account
below); Viejas was dry where CR 30 crosses it, but there was a little
salt-like wetland along CR 20 that had several distant peeps, too far away to
ID.
Had a juvie Black-throated Sparrow along CR 30 with some adults later on,
so that was pretty neat getting those for Willacy County! A little
wetland towards the end of CR 30 near the farm had some stilts, a White-faced
Ibis, and a Shoveler hanging with a couple of Fulvous Whistling Ducks!
From there I just poked up all the dirt roads until I got to FM 1761; one
of them ended up in a sorghum field where a Bronzed Cowbird posed with
sunflowers in the background, and a pretty Lark Sparrow was my consolation
prize
for getting lost amongst the gas wells! What I initially thought was a
pair of Mottled Ducks turned out to be a Mottled with a male Mallard on her
tail! That was a surprise!
Another productive "in-and-out" road was CR 105 (according to Google); the
road crossed a heavily vegetated canal that had tons of Cave Swallows
nesting underneath the bridge! Blue Grosbeaks and Painted Buntings were
singing
up a storm, and White-tailed Hawks and Caracaras patrolled the area. I
took another dicey county road (Horned Lark Heaven) that eventually got me
over to 1761, where I went north to the parking area for the trailhead (no
Masked Ducks in the pond ;-)); was starting to spit, so I reneged on a
hike... The nice topping was a gorgeous male Bullock's Oriole that popped up
on
the way out!
Ended up with 68 species for the morning and a new road-birding route (but
only when it hasn't rained...)! Pictures and recordings are posted here:
http://miriameaglemon.com/photo_gallery/2014%20Field%20Trips/May/La%20Sal%20
Viejas.html
Bird List:
La Sal Vieja- Teniente Tract (LTC 007) , Willacy, US-TX
May 26, 2014 6:46 AM - 11:06 AM
Protocol: Traveling
28.0 mile(s)
Comments: Route begins at the intersection od CR 20 and SR 186, goes
north and then back down CR 30, checking Garza Ranch & Chapa Roads, cutting
over to FM 1761 via CR 3200, then up to the parking lot on Brushline.
68 species
Black-bellied Whistling-Duck 15
Fulvous Whistling-Duck 15
Mallard (Northern) 1 May have been domestic, but was flying behind a
Mottled Duck: apparently wild male Mallard, with dark head and chest
separated by white neck ring; overall paler coloration than the Mottled in
front.
Mottled Duck 3
Northern Shoveler 1
Northern Bobwhite 15
Great Blue Heron 2
Great Egret 1
Snowy Egret 1
Cattle Egret 1
Green Heron 2
White-faced Ibis 1
Black Vulture 1
Turkey Vulture 12
Cooper's Hawk 1
Harris's Hawk 1
White-tailed Hawk 2
Swainson's Hawk 1
Black-necked Stilt 3
Killdeer 2
Laughing Gull 1
Gull-billed Tern 2
Eurasian Collared-Dove 3
White-winged Dove 3
Mourning Dove 100
Common Ground-Dove 20
White-tipped Dove 1
Yellow-billed Cuckoo 10
Groove-billed Ani 1
Common Nighthawk 4
Golden-fronted Woodpecker 7
Ladder-backed Woodpecker 6
Crested Caracara 4
Brown-crested Flycatcher 10
Great Kiskadee 4
Couch's Kingbird 4
Western Kingbird 2
Scissor-tailed Flycatcher 12
Loggerhead Shrike 1
White-eyed Vireo 2
Green Jay 2
Horned Lark 15
Cave Swallow 50
Black-crested Titmouse 5
Verdin 9
Bewick's Wren 12
Cactus Wren 1
Curve-billed Thrasher 1
Long-billed Thrasher 1
Northern Mockingbird 20
European Starling 2
Common Yellowthroat 1
Olive Sparrow 8
Cassin's Sparrow 5
Lark Sparrow 15
Black-throated Sparrow 3
Northern Cardinal 10
Pyrrhuloxia 4
Blue Grosbeak 5
Painted Bunting 8
Dickcissel 5
Red-winged Blackbird 50
Eastern Meadowlark 4
Great-tailed Grackle 100
Bronzed Cowbird 30
Brown-headed Cowbird 1
Bullock's Oriole 1
House Sparrow 20
Mary Beth Stowe
McAllen, TX
_www.miriameaglemon.com_ (http://www.miriameaglemon.com/)
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