Got away from hurricane cleanup on Saturday
Nice not having to cut and burn brush for a day
Gretchen from the FWS Corpus Christi office has asked for birders to look for
banded Piping Plover in order to get some information on possible effects from
the hurricanes. Took this opportunity for Dora Ann and I to do a little
volunteer survey at Matagorda beach for pipers and to check on the unusually
high numbers (500) of Buff-breasted Sandpipers Bob Friedrichs had reported in 2
fields near STP earlier in the week.
Left the house at 6 am and the first turf farms that were visible on the way to
Matagorda were 3 near LaWard in Jackson County. They contained about 150 BBSA
which is pretty good for those sites on this date. Tripped one eBird flag with
the numbers.
Moving on to the Blessing area in Matagorda County, we checked 5 turf farms
nearby. We found 500 BBSA with most being on a farm north of town on railroad
avenue.
We next went to the farms near the STP nuclear plant and were pleased with a
count of 1100 BBSA. It got a little crazy for a few minutes when our leisurely
count was interrupted by a visit from a Cooper's Hawk. Birds scattered and we
had to start counting over again.
Breaking away from looking at turf fields, we made it down to Matagorda beach
by noon. Many birds were roosting within the signage installed by GCBO. We
only found one Piping Plover and it was banded with a yellow flag indicating it
came from the Great Plains. Scanned the relatively calm Gulf for 30 minutes
and did not notice any foraging other than from Brown Pelicans.
Many white marsh birds were observed in the marshes bordering the river. We
tallied 300 White Ibis, 300 Great Egrets and 600 Snowy Egrets.
We had time to check 3 more turf farms on the drive back towards Bay City
before we needed to be back home to watch football games and found 700 more
BBSA.
In summary, we found about 2500 BBSA in mid-September which is well past the
expected peak fall migration in late August. This is a huge number for this
date considering that we only checked a small portion of the turf farms in the
area. Top counts by Bob and I during fall 2015 were 4,000 when we surveyed all
of the turf fields in Matagorda, Wharton, Jackson, Victoria counties.
We had fun looking at lots of birds, but our team, LSU, played badly against
Mississippi State.
Brent & Dora Ann
near Victoria, TX
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