Subject: Texas Gulf Coast Birding
Date: Mar 3 09:14:30 1998
From: "W. William Woods" - wwwbike at halcyon.com


We have just returned from a wonderful trip visiting as many of the
Wildlife Refuges on the Texas Gulf Coast as we could manage. Birding was
terrific; weather spectacular. Two huge flashing, noisy thunderstorms,
sunny warm days, cool windy days, a little bit of everything in the two
weeks we were there. Even had a tornado touch down during one of the big
storms doing some damage near Houston.

Touring the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge by car and by boat was
certainly the highlight of our trip. And yes, we saw the beautiful
Whooping Cranes flying and feeding. We are happy to report that the mature
cranes brought back 30 new young ones from their Wood Buffalo Park
nesting grounds in Canada. And miracle of miracles, one set of twins was
among them. This brings the total of Whooping Cranes in this migrating
flock to 182. Including the non-migrating flock in Florida plus the two
research captive breeding flocks in Pautuxent, Maryland and Bearaboo,
Wisconsin, there are now around 360 Whooping Cranes in existence; a far
cry from the 15 birds counted in 1939.

We also saw many Sandhill Cranes in the pastures and farming areas. The
two crane species use entirely different areas for feeding while they are
wintering in Texas. Whoopers prefer the wetlands (love those blue crabs)
while Sandhills prefer dry pastures.

We saw several Reddish Egrets including the rare white morph form
performing their specialized wing spreading plus running here and there as
they hunt for food in the shallows. We heard that other egrets may imitate
the reddish while in company with them but forget how to do it when
they are by themselves.

Great Blue Herons, Great Egrets, and Snowy Egrets dotted the countryside
always occurring as single individuals or in groups of 2 or 3, never in
flocks. A few Little Blue Herons were seen, both the dark blue matures and
white immatures. Only 1 or 2 of the calico in-betweens were observed. We
did not see any Green Herons. Cattle Egrets lived up to their name; they
associated with cattle though we did see one out of place, rather sorry
looking Cattle Egret on the beach of San Jose Island near Port Aransas
standing around with Laughing Gulls; nice sense of humor.

White and Brown Pelicans were everywhere. It is hard to believe that the
Brown Pelican was once a threatened species due to the use of DDT but they
have come back strongly. Many of them were into breeding plumage,
gorgeous. The White Pelicans were not thinking about breeding this early.

Several large flocks of White Ibis with their long scarlet down-curved
bills and black wing tips flew around, practicing for their early return
to nesting areas further north. We even saw a few White-faced Ibis , just
a few at a time. Experts say it is impossible to tell the White-faced from
the Glossy Ibis in the field on their winter range but geographic location
indicates they were probably White-faced, oh such beautiful iridescent
feathers.

The Roseate Spoonbills seemed to be in small groups, never saw any big
congregations of them. Such a beatuiful shade of rose and pink they are
and the way they swish that greenish spoon-shaped bill back and forth in
the shallow waters is unique.

We got some excellent views of the Tri-colored Heron from a boardwalk at
Port Lavaca; hope that Bill got some good pictures too. Never realized how
small they were, about the size of a Little Blue Heron, really quite
dainty.

And then we saw the little owl-like Black-crowned Night Herons all lined
up at night on the posts of the harbor at the U. of Texas Marine Studies
Institute at Port Aransas. Yes, during the night they occupy the posts
used by Pelicans during the day; fascinating, big-eyed, little white
shapes at night, not the sleepy eyed birds you see roosting during the
daytime.

Enough for now; don't want to bore you. I guess I get carried away when
I write about our birding experiences.

Erin

Bill and Erin Woods
Woods Tree Farm, Redmond, WA U.S.A.
<wwwbike at halcyon.com>