Got going a little late today as someone set the alarm for the wrong time.
Got out on east beach with a couple of horned larks on the way and then the
pomarine jaeger down at the corner past the jetty. Just past him, the
lingering gray red knot was feeding with a single western sandpiper. 3
unbanded american oystercatchers. Only a couple of sanderlings and ruddy
turnstones were around. the usual summering semipalmated plovers.
Commonest bird was about 240 american avocets.
Had the first tern chick of the year, a caspian with a parent. It is an
interesting experience when a caspian tern starts yelling and head right at
your head with the red mouth wide open. It made 3 passes after the chick
moved inside the barrier to join other caspians. Had a total of 15 for the
area.
Snowy and wilson's plovers were interacting. In some parking lot puddles
had a few more western sandpipers and a breeding plumaged white-rumped
sandpiper.
Tides were still rather high but had washed back into the vegetation along
the channel and breached into the lagoon down the channel.
Very few birds along the ferry. Several singing painted buntings continue
along Frenchtown road which had some water on the pavement. Clapper rails
out but no shorebird habitat. A couple of painted bunting also on the start
of Retillon Road. No shorebirds at Fort Travis and no wet spots.
Bolivar flats was rather empty. Almost no birds along the beach and there
was more beach than in recent trips. But the good shorebird feeding areas
down closer to the jetty were still underwater.
3 more unbanded oystercatchers. Roosting semipalmated plovers with a single
piping plover. 15 reddish egrets remained but the banded bird was absent.
The least tern nest from Monday was gone but 3 birds were doing fish games
at the spot. Later 2 least terns dropped down just in front of me and one
laid an egg amid lots of odd calling. Not going to do well as the egg was
in the new debris just deposited and about 2 feet from the water. The terns
then scolded me a bit and left.
Watched a wilson's plover catch a ghost crab about an inch across. Worked
at getting legs etc off and ate them as removed. Started to carry it off.
Mother plover then charged and took over the crab. Later on or the other
took it back to where a couple of chicks were hiding. Still had one claw.
Really big prey for a small bird. Took a lot more work to dismember a crab
than when a whimbrel or night heron grabs a crab.
Highest water of the season at Rollover pass had all bird areas covered.
Nothing along the highway and a good delay for the repaving.
The rice fields along 1985 had the best water and shorebird habitat for the
year. However the shorebirds are gone and I did not find any.
The Anahuac rookery in the reeds in shoveler pond were busy and you can now
hear youngsters.
Best bird for the refuge was a singing red-eyed vireo singing in the woods
behind the service area. You can hear it and get a glimpse from the road to
the boat launch opposite the shoveler pond road.
Worked up to I10 along back roads where there have been hawks and kites in
the past but had none.
Good birds out there despite the heat etc.
--
Joseph C. Kennedy
on Buffalo Bayou in West Houston
Josephkennedy36@xxxxxxxxx
