Remembering the Birds, Part II

I had too many wonderful encounters with birds to be able to get even the best ones into one blog.  So this blog commences where the last blog left off.  They include Montana Birds, and then the birds I found back in Texas this past fall.  I have really love getting to see birds in their breeding plumage and giving the calls and songs they use to maintain their territories . 

Long-billed curlews bred in our prairies at Red Rock Lakes and often flew overhead calling

Western Grebe with a red-necked grebe on Widgeon Pond, Red Rock Lakes NWR - The western grebe was the only one but the red-necked grebe had a girlfriend follow him in a few days later.  

Horned Lark in Breeding Dress

Yellow headed black-birds sang their whirring song -  sounding more like
a strange little toy than a bird. 

I only had these birds in my yard for a day - saw the parent feeding a child by my little creek - Evening grosbeaks. 

As soon as I set up my feeding station in my yard, I had a yard full of Cassin's finches.

Male Cassin's finch

Female Cassin's finch




I had lots of pine siskins at my feeders - they loved niger seed and the babies would let me
 get within a few feet of them when I was refilling feeders.



A male Wilson's Phalarope feeding near his nest - males tend the kids while the
women wear the fancy clothes and enjoy life.

Snipe singing from a fence post

Monitoring the mountain bluebirds and the tree swallows were part of my job. I never got tired of watching them in and out of the nest. Their house wars led me to research their interactions and ultimately, build more nest boxes and put some up in pairs.  

Mountain bluebirds at their nest box

Mother tree swallows often stay in the nest before they start sitting on eggs.




A short-eared owl that nested near one of my fence projects



One of the pair of eagles that constantly cursed me while I hunted unsuccessfully for their nest



One of a couple of baby killdeers foraging with their mom in Yellowstone NP



Gray jays were the iconic Yellowstone birds - they always showed
 right up when we set out our lunches.

September was hummer season at my trailer. I spent hours enthralled by the hords of hummers that came through.

Broad-tailed hummingbird

Rufous Hummingbird - the yard bully

While the broad-tailed hummers would share a flower

One of our many Swainson's hawks - here hacking up a pellet

The barn owl with a second chance being released after being caught on barbed wire and rescued

The rest of the pictures are from Texas.

A few of a few hundred marbled godwits feeding in a field at Fort Travis on the Upper Texas Coast

A great blue and a tricolor heron show off their comparative sizes at Galveston State Park

Wood storks and roseate spoonbills on Champion Lake in Trinity River NWR

A comparison of the larger juvenile double-crested cormorant with the three little neotropical
cormorants at Champion's Lake in the Trinity River NWR

Birds have played a huge part in my life this past year and I'm grateful for all of them and hope they will live on. Many of them are at risk.

For more wild bird blogs, click on the picture.

The Birds of Brundage Lane

June 20, 2016

I've been dying to get to go birding on Brundage Lane, the road that connects the South and North Valley Roads on the west. But it has several low spots that are made of clay and, when it rains, the road is impassable except for a 4-wheel drive vehicle.  Today I finally had a good road and time to go visit.

Brundage Lane has all the birds we have on the refuge - it's only few miles off the refuge - but it has marsh and ponds very close to the road, so I often get much better shots of birds.  Today the light lasted through a partly cloudy morning that gave me lots of shots that made me happy.

I hope you enjoy them too.

I'm only seeing one sandhill rathan than a pair - think moma is on the nest

I  think this is the first phalarope I've ever seen feeding on land - probably tending his nest. 

Yellow-headed blackbirds were everywhere that was wet, singing their mechanical, whirring song - this one is exhibiting the attitude I associate with them 

This was the first day I've seen female yellow-headed blackbirds. 

Long-billed curlews were flying and calling their loud, ringing calls everywhere -
a few were also feeding in the tall grass

Brewer's blackbirds were hanging out around the cattle in the fields

There were many vesper sparrows about

Horned larks spent most of their time running in front of the car -
one of the easiest ways to ID them here. 

A cliff swallow fledgling - I couldn't get the picture of a parent
 feeding it through my dirty windshield

A very surprising find - a snipe s-i-t-t-i-n-g on a fence post - I probably have 20 pictures of him

He was so close, I missed his feet in this shot but loved seeing/hearing him call

This little green-winged teal was at a distance and looked like he was swimming through pale grass 

I was practicing shooting a hawk on the fly and while I held my shutter down,  the courting pair crossed to give me this lucky shot. 

The rest of my day was mundane - doing my wash, cleaning, and shopping. But I will always remember it as special for all the amazing birds I got to see.  Click on the picture below to see bird blogs from around the world.

Wild Bird Wednesday: Some of the Water Birds of Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge

Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge was established to save the Trumpeter Swan from extinction.  Our shallow lakes and marshes also support many other species that require wetlands or open water.

These are some of the water birds that breed on the refuge.

Wilson's phalarope is one of my favorite birds.  They feed by turning round and round to stir bugs up off the bottom of the water. Then they pick them off the surface. It makes for a wild dance when there are several of them feeding together.  I also love that the males are the plain ones and the females are the pretty ones.  The males sit on the eggs while the female goes off to find another boyfriend.

Male Wilson's phalarope

I've paddled from Florida to Canada and on almost every paddle, I've seen one or more spotted sandpipers. I think of them as the paddler's mascot.  I was wandering around near Picnic Springs and taking pictures when I realized a spotted sandpiper was feeding only a few yards away.  I mostly see them without spots so I love their summer attire.

We have white pelicans breeding here as well. Both sexes grow a "horn" in breeding season . This is shed afterwards.

American white pelican

Windblown American white pelican

Another bird which is about the same size as the pelican, is the trumpeter swan.  These birds almost went extinct. When there were only about 70 individuals left, they were found living year around here where they use warm springs. The refuge was established to provide habitat for these birds.  Now there are over 3000 of them and they are in many states.  I think the brownish color on the head and neck are stains.   These are a breeding pair but were not quite close enough together to get them in the same picture.

Trumpeter swan

Trumpeter swan with northern shoveler

We have eighteen species of ducks that breed here.  But the ducks we have the most of are lesser scaup.   The refuge has been banding all the babies they can catch for several years so we can learn where they go.  This species is in decline in many areas.  I never have very good duck pictures because they swim or fly away every time I get near them. 

Male cinnamon teal

Male pintail

A lesser  scaup pair

Western grebe (l) and red-necked grebe (r)

A few birds, while often found on the land, are wading birds or are related to birds that use water. One of them is the long-billed curlew.  I love hearing their calls as they fly over the wetlands and dry meadows.

Long-billed curlew

I think sandhills are the stateliest of birds, second only to the whooping cranes. And I love the dances they do to pair bond and as families. I ALMOST got a movie of them dancing the other day but I apparently didn't push my movie button hard enough.

Our sandhill cranes are much redder than most  others

A closer look at a sandhill crane

Check out other wildbird posts from around the world.

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