[texbirds] Travis County Big Day, 28 April - 170 species including Pacific Loon

From: Eric Carpenter <ecarpe@xxxxxxxxx>
To: Texbirds <texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2013 11:14:40 -0500
Yesterday (Sunday, 28 April), my team "Every Which Way But Goose" ran
our 4th annual Travis County Big Day.  All four of us (Kenny Anderson,
Maggie Burnett, Paul Sunby and myself) have had a busy schedule this
spring so did only minimal scouting. Still, we have a route we like
that we don't stray from much anyway so we think remaining (mostly)
faithful to that route will give us the best rewards.  We have also
learned that plugging through slow times in the afternoon can pay off
and it did big time yesterday as we crushed our previous high of 158
with a total of 170 species seen/heard in the county.

We start these crazy days a little after 3am and this year's pre-dawn
birding went better than ever.  The mostly windless early morning
hours proved helpful as we knocked out our pre-dawn targets on
schedule and with little stress.  The early morning efforts went
likewise with many of the resident/breeders making themselves known at
the expected times & places.  We diverged from our normal route a
little bit with a stop at Mansfield Dam Park as we were hoping to cash
in on the lingering Common Loons and potential for shorebirds at Windy
Point.  After a few minutes where we had already spied a distant
Willet and had what we thought was the lone remaining Common Loon fly
past us, we spied two other loons in the channel and were quite
excited (to say the least) when one of them turned out to be a Pacific
Loon, an unexpected new county bird for all of us.  My digiscoping
efforts leave a little to be desired, but I think we have enough
captured to document this one (you can even see the chin strap
somewhat in the photos):

   http://www.flickr.com/photos/ecarpe/8692026561/in/set-72157633379635618/

So by mid-morning we thought we might have something really special
working with over 100 species as we heading to our first stops on the
east side of the county.  There, our excitement was met with a big
dose of what the reality here is most springs in central Texas -
sunny, warm (temps reached the low 80s) cloudless days with a
prevailing southerly wind. Great for migrating birds and watching for
birds stream by overhead but not ideal for wringing out migrants or
resident birds on the ground.  We had a few misses and several species
took much longer than anticipated to track down and the migrants we
did see were in low numbers and hard to find.  Our best morning in 4
years had turned into our worst afternoon in 4 years.  We skipped a
few spots and lingered longer than we needed to at others.  Still, as
we plugged along we knew our total was going to be close to our
previous high and we were re-energized during the long afternoon by an
out-of-place Bronzed Cowbird and later on, a stunning male Scarlet
Tanager.

As 9pm rolled around, and with us all rather tired and not even really
trying to find our last target (Barn Owl), we found ourselves at 170
species for the day and decided that was a good final number to stop
at.  At our usual post-day dinner/happy hour, we were again left
wondering how big the number could have been or could be under the
perfect conditions.  This is not the first time we have run our Big
Day that day after we thought was a better migration day and it is
also hard to imagine going a day without such birds as Baltimore
Oriole or even Marsh Wren, which is a perpetual Big Day jinx bird for
us.  The little scouting we did is also a mixed blessing as two of the
better birds that we had uncovered during scouted (Vermilion
Flycatcher, Red-breasted Merganser) were missing-in-action on the
actual day.  All of this just provides inspiration to try again next
year I think and what fun would it be if things went as hoped for
anyway? I think we all enjoy the thinking & planning & plotting these
things out as the actual day and it is that part of it along with the
actual day that makes it all quite exciting.

--
Eric Carpenter
Austin
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[texbirds] Travis County Big Day, 28 April - 170 species including Pacific Loon

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