It Might As Well Be Spring

In, at least the southern half of Texas, spring usually arrives by the third weekend of February and soon we are having our brief spring fling before summer comes in tripping over spring's heels. The signs of spring are growing each day since last weekend.

Pale, hairy legs have appeared, including mine.

Photo by Bob Scaldino. And I'm indulging in my spring compulsion to play in the dirt.

The martins are here - the females also - and are getting their houses ready for a new generation. And  our barn swallows that build there nests on the old Visitor Center are back. I caught them trying to find their nest which was a casualty of the Visitor Center transformation.  

The geese are leaving.  I heard a large flock calling goodby through last Thursday night's fog as they flew northward.

Bye!

 Our harriers have mostly left to start nests in the northern states and Canada.

Bye Harriers!

Tiny new leaves are appearing and flower buds are swelling and even bursting out.

Photo by Bob Scaldino. Our coral vine is about to bloom while waiting to be planted

Photo by Bob Scaldino. Our recently rooted willows are already supporting pollinators

Our Mexican Plums waiting to be planted

Even the redbuds are starting to bloom in their pots

And our alligators are out and eating.  We saw one grab a turtle yesterday. They usually don't eat below an ambient temperature of 70 degrees.

Photo by Bob Scaldino    Sunning alligator.

So, it might as well be spring.

Note:  My friend Bob Scaldino was visiting me.  I made him take pictures while I drove.

Birds du Jour - at the Bolivar Jetty

Yesterday I went to the Gulf Coast Master Naturalist meeting in Houston via Galveston, where I had arranged to get some recycled pots for plant projects. I went via the Bolivar/Galveston ferry and gave myself a little reward by stopping at the Jetty.

WOW! What a reward!  Avocets, Avocets, Avocets - by the thousands - sitting and sleeping or jumping up into flight, only to land back in the same positions and get back to their naps.

A few of the thousands of Avocets

And hundreds of skimmers.  Several flocks came in and joined the group while I was there.

Skimmers in the sky and foreground along with godwits.
About one third of the avocets are in the background.

Other birds there included gulls, royal terns, western willets, Hudsonian godwits, western sandpippers, great egrets and double crested cormorants.

Hudsonian Godwit and Western Willet

 The two subspecies of willets are very interesting to me.  For years, I had to relearn willets each fall and spring.  Finally I learned that we have the eastern version in the spring/summer and the western version in the fall winter. The western is paler, a little hunkier, and has a heavier bill.

Feeding Hudsonian godwits

Feeding western sandpipers

  I was also able to see several species of flowers in bloom.  A good thing for the few monarch butterflies still around. (And by the way, my Galveston friend has two Monarch caterpillars on very small Butterfly weed that I grew from cuttings taken in August.)

Still not sure what this is.

Indian Blanket (Gaillardia pulchella)

Smoth Oxeye ( Heliopsis helianthoides)  This is supposed to bloom June - September but
obviously it can't tell our crazy seasons.

And I was able to get a couple of hundred free pots.  And then attend and interesting meeting.  A very good day.

Birds du Jour

Today I hauled trash and took my camera along.  There were some great new birds and good looks at some old friends. A black-neck stilt was lingering, long after most of his friends had left for their winter vacation. Ditto for a cattle egret.  I saw my first common loon of the season as well as red-breasted mergansers and bufflehead.We still have lots or redtailed hawks, harriers, and kestrals and sometimes see merlin, perigrine, and red-shouldered hawks.  And on the highway between the VIS and the trailer, two caracaras flew across the road right in front of me. Couldn't stop and grab the camera in time to catch them.

The black-necked stilt was in the VIS pond .

The refuge is managed for geese, ducks, and alligators. So we have lots of snow geese.

The common loon was off Frozen Point in East Bay.

This pair of white-tailed kites arrived a few weeks ago.

A strange mix of laughing gulls and bufflehead.

Red-breasted mergansers

We have lots of great egrets but I love watching them. 

This pie-billed grebe will get a black band in February