Hey,
At least the best I’ve ever had. I birded Harry Moss Park in NE Dallas county
first until about 11 am, stopped by Oak Grove Park on Lake Grapevine for the
continuing Ruddy Turnstones and my county Sanderlings, and then worked the
Village Creek Drying beds from 1315-1730. Without a doubt, the heavy rains on
Saturday and Saturday night must have coincided with a heavy migrant flight
that knocked down a lot of birds.
Harry Moss Park HMP has just been smoking hot this whole past week, with lots
of warblers, Yellow-throated vireo, and Veery reported. This was my first time
in the park, and it was amazing. The pecan grove just east of the creek was had
lots of birds, and I ended up with 15 warblers species, 4 vireo species (not
the Yellow-throated unfortunately), and great looks at singing Alder and Wilow
Flycatchers. There were other birders at the park and we kept getting each
other on different birds - I found a female Hooded Warbler, and others got me
on a gorgeous, tame male Bay-breasted along with a female Blackpoll. These,
along with the two Traill’s Flycatchers and a singing Philadelphia Vireo, were
all Dallas county birds for me! Probably the last time I ever get 6 county
birds in a day, geez.
I was particularly pleased with the singing Alder and Willow Flycatchers, but I
didn’t realize how many flycatchers had been knocked down over DFW - from
conversations with others, pretty much everyone had singing Alder and Willows
today, along with lots of Least and some Yellow-bellied. Thanks to a tip from
Ed Wetzel I headed over to Village Creek (VCDB) to try to get my Tarrant county
Willow Flycatcher, thinking that even though it was mid-day I would at least be
able to work all the willow trees and manage to find at least one Traill’s with
a whit call, maybe even singing. I got my rain boots on and worked through the
big willows on the south-east corner, walking just in the short water very
slowly (only got water in my boots once or twice!). This proved to be a
wonderful strategy, because the water made me move very slow, and the birds
just didn’t seem to notice me. Only one snake. In this area alone I had 1
Willow Flycatcher, 4-5 Alder Flycatchers, Yellow-bellied Flycatcher, Eastern
Wood-Pewee, a late Lincoln’s Sparrow, and 12 warblers species including
Blackburnian and a male Mourning, my 16th warbler species of the day. I felt
like I was birding the Willows at Anahuac!
Anyway, I ended up with just ludicrous numbers of Traill’s Flycatchers,
anything identified to species was by call, and I saw all the calling Willows.
Got decent recordings of both species at both parks, including singing Alder at
both parks and a singing Willow at HMP. Empid list as follows:
Yellow-bellied Flycatcher: 1 VCDB
Alder: 2 HMP, 8 VCDB
Willow: 1 HMP, 2 VCDB
Traill’s: 3 HMP, 4 VCDB
Least: 3 HMP, 5 VCDB
empidonax sp: 4 HMP, 8 VCDB
10! Alder Flycatchers - this doubled the number of Alders I had detected in my
birding career. Also got 5 Tarrant county birds - Willow and Yellow-bellied
Flycatchers, Northern Waterthrush, Mourning Warbler, and Sanderling.
HMP checklist: https://ebird.org/checklist/S69211231
VCDB checklist: https://ebird.org/checklist/S69237248
Good birding! Keep birding in May!
Christian Walker
christian.icapadjuster@xxxxxxxxx
Independent Adjuster
Irving, Texas
(512) 745-3227
