The winter birds are not all here yet, but they are beginning to straggle in. Ann and I went to our local parks yesterday and spent about two hours. We spotted twenty-three different species in that short time. Of course, some of them were residents, but we spotted a few Eastern Bluebirds, Yellow-rumped Warblers, a Greater Yellowlegs, three Pied-billed Grebes, and a few Gadwalls.
In other news, some friends of ours moved back to Abilene, so we went to visit them. During the day we visited the bird blind at Abilene State Park. Wow! What a disappointment. It is definitely not photographer friendly. Several vertical ‘slats’, for want of another word, are spaced about 10 inches apart across the window. Nor was it exactly great bird watching either in our visit. The water facility didn’t have any water for example. It is very tiny. There are several feeders right in front of the window that I thought was distracting. It just seems to me that everything was just placed in a hap-hazardly manner. Maybe it was just me, but I could see no organization it it. In the thirty minutes we were there we saw exactly two bird species. Black-crested Titmouse and Carolina Chickadee. I think they need to visit our blind here in San Angelo or the nice ones at Pedernales Falls SP.
Great Egret – photographed near Abilene, Texas
So that is my rant for the day. The above photo, by the way, was not photographed near the bird blind. Of course, you probably knew that.
Vermilion Flycatcher from my archives. March 2014
Today, I have been going back through my archives, and it seems that I keep making these discoveries. The following photo was taken during a trip to Knoxville, Tennessee, way back in 2008. We had been visiting our dear friends, the Tappans. Ann and I, along with Deb and Paul were driving along the Tennessee River. Deb is an awesome photographer, too, so when we came across a rookery of Black-crowned Night Herons, we promptly got our equipment ready. There were at least one hundred of them, some flying around, and others roosting. I had been wondering where those photos were, and I found them in a folder buried inside another folder.
A happy Black-crowned Night Heron from my archives. June 2008
Our 2014 Big Year list is at 193 right now. As I have mentioned before, we have a goal of hitting 200 by the end of the year so we only have seven to go. Sounds easy, but we have to get to work. We are going back to the Davis Mountains later this month, then a few weeks later we hope to make another trip to Uvalde. Then there might be even time for a few days to visit the Big Bend area. Hopefully, we can find those seven during those trips.
Texas Tweeties by Bob Zeller 