I'm a bit uneasy about sharing this with our Washington list, but there
is such a bunch of rarities down there now. If you don't share or
appreciate the thrill of long distance rare bird chasing please sent
this to your trash folder. If you're interested in what's it like on
the ground there now read on.

My Montana brother and I got back early this morning from 3.5 days
birding the Rio Grande from Laredo to Brownsville. The tic-dip data
exchange between birders who seem to have made the choice of optics
instead of their children's college education indicate that most
everyone was seeing most everything they were seriously after.

Rose-throated Becards are being found in a number of places, but don't
expect to trip over them.

A single Gray-crowned Yellow throat continues at Sabal Palm. The exact
location is well known and the male is doing some singing, but staying
hidden and breaking hearts. He will pop up every now and again bringing
cheers from the crowd.

A Golden-crowned Warbler is looking for insects low in the brush SE of
the pond of the University of Texas Brownsville. You want to go after
this one early in the day.

Frontera Audubon in Weslaco is probably the hottest spot with most
everyone easily finding White-throated Robin, Crimson-collered Grosbeak,
and a lone Elegant Trogon.

The Blue Bunting at Santa Ana NWR is not easy, and the reported Masked
Ducks at the Santa Ana Cattail ponds are being so hard to find that many
are wondering if they really exist.

The real time sucker is Roadside Hawk. I'm beginning to embrace my
brother's theory that there are three individuals being reported. There
is a well confirmed one roosting at the White-collared Seedeater
preserve in San Ygnacio, which is about to realize that life is less
complicated on the other side of the river. There is a probable one at
Santa Ana and there is a maybe one off Cannon Road 20 miles west of
Brownsville. The best we could do is a maybe of the maybe.

There is a lone male Seedeater at the preserve. We also got two fly
overs at San Ygnacio of seven Wild Muscoveys. This can be a very
difficult species to locate.

The Social Flycatcher and Green-breasted Mango are history.

If money is more important than time your ticket to San Antonio (or
Austin) will be half of that for one of the local airports. When I
returned the rental vehicle at Austin it was 82 degrees under clear
skies.

You may never get another chance at this group of birds in (more or
less) one place.

I'm going looking for the Issaquah Snowy owl.

Good birding.

Larry Schwitters
Issaquah