[texbirds] Zavala and Maverick County Birding

From: Sheridan Coffey <sngcanary@xxxxxxxxx>
To: Texbirds - Email <texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>, SATXbirds <SATXbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 27 Jan 2013 19:25:50 -0800 (PST)
Dear all,
yesterday morning Martin and I decided to do some birding in an area where we 
had never been. Ebird is fairly silent about Zavala and Maverick Counties, so 
that was our choice. We had a great time and plan on doing a lot more in these 
counties.
We started the day in Frio County, where we have birded a lot, at the sod farm 
on Hwy 57 and FM 140. We were rather surprised to find almost no birds. This 
has been our go-to place for Mountain Plovers for the last several years. We 
didn't even find any Killdeer, meadowlarks or pipits. There was a Merlin 
working the field; maybe he was particularly voracious. There was one surprise, 
a Burrowing Owl perched on a stack of pallets near the road. 
http://www.flickr.com/photos/sngcanary/8422671858/in/photostream
Warning- this is a heavily cropped, not so great photo.


We moved into Zavala County where we found a number of ducks on small ponds 
near the highway. There were numerous hawks on the telephone lines and fences, 
including a gorgeous rufous morph Red-tail and a dark morph Harlen's Hawk, Our 
best stop was at a ranch between Batesville and La Pryor. We had seen a 
White-tailed Kite flying by and were trying to re-find it. We then saw a small 
flock of Sandhill Cranes landing in a field and stopped, only to see over 300 
cranes feeding. As I got out of the car, two Sprague's Pipits flew up over my 
head. We could hear American Pipits and a flock of Horned Larks were working 
the field. As Martin was going through the cranes with a scope, hoping for the 
over-due Common Crane, when I saw a Prairie Falcon on the irrigation rig. 


Maverick County was also very interesting. We picked up some ducks at the city 
park in Eagle Pass. We went through the border fence to the banks of the Rio 
Grande, where we had an Osprey and a few ducks. I picked up Golden-fronted 
Woodpecker and Great Kiskadee for Mexico on the other side. We drove north 
towards Quemado on Hwy 277, detouring on a few side roads. Our favorite was FM 
1907, just south west of the Maverick County International Airport. This road 
had a few houses and a number of scrubby fields. We found some Black-throated 
Sparrows and a few other birds. The best part was at the end of the road. It 
dead ends at a hydro-electric plant. The gate was open and it looked like 
visitors were welcome. We walked in and spoke with a woman who lives on the 
property and she said it was fine to bird there. There are a couple of 
intersecting canals that had quite a few ducks. Five Black Phoebes were along 
the main canal, along with a male Vermilion
 Flycatcher. There is a patch of woods that had at least a dozen Olive 
Sparrows. A pair of Carolina Wrens were fussing. It was mid afternoon, so the 
birds were rather quiet. I feel like this spot could be excellent earlier in 
the morning. Other birds along were Eastern Bluebirds in the pecan groves, 
numerous Red-tails and Harris's Hawks and Northern Harriers. 


All in all, we didn't have anything earth shattering, but it was a lot of fun 
to go someplace we had never been before. There are so many counties in Texas 
that get very little coverage. I highly recommend finding one near you and 
making a trip. You might find the next great hot spot!


Sheridan Coffey
San Antonio, Tx
http://sngcanary1.blogspot.com/
www.flickr.com/sngcanary

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[texbirds] Zavala and Maverick County Birding

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