[texbirds] Port Aransas, July 4-6

From: Mikael Behrens <mikaelb@xxxxxxxxx>
To: TexBirds <texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 7 Jul 2013 16:58:25 -0500
Howdy,

I spent the weekend in Port Aransas for the holiday weekend. It's a notoriously 
crowded time to be here, and not very interesting bird-wise. But I made it to 
three of the main birding spots and still enjoyed seeing the expected birds and 
finding a few unexpected things.

On July 5, Paradise Pond had a male and female Painted Bunting, and a 
heard-only Summer Tanager. The tanager was flagged as unexpected by eBird, so I 
recorded the call on my iPhone. Here's the observation on iNaturalist with the 
recording:

http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/323948

Many Black Terns are moving through the area. They were present at the Turnbull 
Birding Center by the dozen, and were also visible from the pavilion of the 
Charlie's Pasture Nature Preserve.

A hot afternoon visit to the Turnbull Birding Center on July 6 was unexpectedly 
fun. There were three Magnificent Frigatebirds flying over the water and 
dipping into it periodically. There were at least 15 Ruddy Ducks -- even 
parents with ducklings. I didn't know they breed here. American Coot and Common 
Gallinule chicks were also fun to see. And there was one Lesser Scaup in basic 
plumage. See the second photo on the iNaturalist observation here:

http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/323081

Based on the second photo, it might be in a molt and currently unable to fly.

Here's my iNaturalist journal entry for the same period, which is the same as 
this email but also includes links to my eBird lists and all of the other 
observations I posted:

http://www.inaturalist.org/journal/mikaelb/1843

I've been greatly enjoying iNaturalist.org and highly recommend it to 
complement eBird and support non-bird observations!

Mikael Behrens
Port Aransas for the holiday
Nueces Country

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[texbirds] Port Aransas, July 4-6

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