Greetings All:
A while back I gave a presentation - at a TOS meeting - on the
strategies that I use while working on county hundreds. Perhaps, if
we have meetings again someday, a repeat would be a good thing to do?
I was generally able to get a county over the top in two visits
provided that a) I had done some research on Google Earth (eBird is
even better) and b) that I visited during different seasons. I don't
think there are many counties that can't be added in,say, two
two-three hour visits during winter and either spring, summer, or
fall. Fall and spring won't work - same set of birds - and spring and
summer or summer and fall both seem to generate too much overlap. The
research is critical as well, there is nothing wrong with visiting
hotspots (eBird) or likely looking habitat (Google Earth).
This opens up to a cluster strategy: it is more efficient to visit a
cluster of counties twice (say Dickens, Crosby, Motley, Floyd, and
Hale - two hours apiece in winter and two hours apiece in any other
season) than it is to try to get each county over the top in a single
visit. Even if you could achieve 100 in each of these counties in a
day (hard but doable) the cluster strategy kicks out five counties in
two days whereas the one county at a time strategy kicks out, if you
are lucky, five counties in five days.
Second tip, double dip. There are a lot of bodies of water that offer
the opportunity to work multiple counties. Loving County would be
hard except you can work the Loving County side of Red Bluff Reservoir
from the Reeves County side of Red Bluff Reservoir. The same applies
to many rivers and creeks in, for some reason, the eastern half of
Texas. Rich Kostecke and I have used this strategy to great effect,
working two counties at once from fishing sites under bridge
crossings.
Third piece of advice, hotels aren't that nice. Camping is a great
way to pick up nocturnals and you are right where you want to be when
you wake up.
The last bit of advice, particularly in my part of the state: consult
locals to find out where water is available. Crane County, for
example is hard, until you realize that you can scan the Crane Water
Treatment Ponds from the top of the risers at the nearby, public
baseball field.
Anthony Hewetson; Lubbock
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