Louisiana, 2013

The end of a year is drawing near.  It was another great year in Louisiana birding, in some ways maybe the best I can remember.  There were great storylines: The Razorbill invasion made it here by a razor thin margin of 1, there was an inland Brown Booby invasion, Iceland Gulls posed, and SE LA had a flurry of great birds in the spring for many to see. 

It was also one of the most ordinary years I can remember.  The species count for the state is on par with every recent year other than the oasis year of 2011.  Spring migration in SWLA was mostly a miss, and fall migration never really happened on the ground here.  Wintering birds have been steady but not spectacular with no Green-tailed Towhee or even nuthatch-type invasions. 

     

One interesting fact, though, is that the ho-hum 2013 species count for the state happened in spite of poor pelagic coverage and results.  If regular offshore species had been seen, this year would have gone down as being nicely above average in terms of species numbers.  But there wasn't much to speak of in terms of pelagic birds, and in essence, a strong onshore effort saved our year list.  How?  2013 saw the rise of the best crop of Louisiana birders ever, and they found great stuff high and low.  LSU has its best crop of birding students since the 90s, NE and NW Louisiana have developed a phenomenal core of birders, recent additions to the birding scene statewide have graduated into solid veteran birders, and some brand new birders have impressed with their relatively advanced skills of observation.  Our state has a birding force to be proud of.  Among its 2013 finds were: Common Merganser, Western Grebe, Brown Booby, Golden Eagle, White-tailed Hawk, Ferruginous Hawk, Rough-legged Hawk, Ruff, Razorbill, California Gull, Iceland Gull, Thayer’s Gull, Glaucous Gull, Great Black-backed Gull, Lesser Nighthawk, Great Kiskadee, Tropical Kingbird, Couch’s Kingbird, Gray Kingbird, Fork-tailed Flycatcher, Bell’s Vireo, Yellow-Green Vireo, Black-whiskered Vireo, Chestnut-collared Longspur, Connecticut Warbler, Tropical Parula, Black-throated Gray Warbler, Townsend’s Warbler, Spotted Towhee, and Bullock’s Oriole. 

Not too shabby. Louisiana has never before seen such birding skill as it did in 2013.

Louisiana birders have been lucky, too, and that's nothing new.  The foundation for Louisiana birding was laid down long ago by LSU, and LSU has strengthened the base.  From 3x5 cards to Labird, our state has a centralized and scientific approach to watching birds that many states lack.  The ease of plugging into our state network and the fact that Louisiana birders are in essence modest scientific contributors rather than birding megalomaniacs on the loose is what makes birding here such a treat.  It isn't like that everywhere.  A while back, I saw a letter to the editor of a birding magazine that expressed an opinion that the magazine should have fewer articles about birds and more about birders.  Amazingly, some American birders think like that.  Luckily for us, that birder-first, selfie mentality was absent from Louisiana in 2013.  Let’s hope it stays beyond our borders for many years to come!  

Henslow's Sparrow

Yesterday, I stumbled onto a little group of Henslow's Sparrows.  It was the first time I'd ever seen these birds in Cameron Parish, and I'm hoping that the type of field that I found them in will give me a clue about where to look for them in the future.  This is what the field looked like:

I was walking across the short, matted grass of this slightly wet field hoping to kick a Le Conte's Sparrow out of the rust-colored broomsedge in the background when a little bird flushed weakly out at my feet.  I saw that it was a grass sparrow, but surprisingly, the bird looked rusty brown instead of blond like a Le Conte's.  I quickly followed it, and kicked up another like it on the way, also out of the thick, matted pale grass.

By the time I got to the spot where the first bird had hit the ground, it must've done some running, because it didn't flush again.  However, I happened to notice a bird looking at me from a dense clump of some other kind of grass twenty or thirty feet away.  Did it run that fast?

Luckily the sun had come out after a rainy night, and it looked like the bird was comfortable basking in rays. These little grass sparrows are usually easiest to see at times when they crave the sun, such as a sunny morning after a frosty night, or when the sun comes out after a rain.  I put the camera to my eye and started walking toward the bird, and got pretty close.  

The greenish ground color of the face, the wide white eye-ring, and the necklace of streaks are all good field marks.  So is the rusty back, although the beautiful colors and intricate pattern of the back don't get the attention I think they deserve.  This is one beautiful little bird.  

I ended up flushing 3 of these birds, but only this one gave me an extended look.  

These birds are most common in the winter in pine savannas, especially when those grasslands have been burned recently.  I don't know if this field is typical of what Henslow's Sparrow like on the coastal prairie. I've walked through fields like this before without luck, and I've seen them in thicker fields that have more upright grass mixed with broomsedge.  Whatever the case, it gives me a new possibility to explore when looking for these birds.    

  

Cameron Parish, 12/07/2013

Mac Myers and I decided the cold, windy weather might be worth looking for birds in on Saturday, so we took a trip down to the coast.  We hit Holly Beach first, and the first bird we saw on the beach was a Merlin sitting on some beach driftwood.  It would turn out to be a good day for raptors.

The wind was strong out of the north and it had pushed the tide way out, but there really weren't a lot of gulls or shorebirds.  We're entering into the time of year when beaches have the least bird diversity and lowest numbers of the year--just in time for Christmas Bird Counts.

Offshore, the seas were laying flat in the wind.  I had hoped that rougher seas offshore would bring ducks closer to the shore, but there weren't many dots bobbing on the Gulf waters.  We eventually found a flock of scaup, a few Red-breasted Mergansers, and a nice flock of scoters.  At first we spotted 8 Black Scoters, but as we tracked them diving and following the current, 2 Surf Scoters joined them and 2 scoters flew by and kept going.  Hopefully it will be a nice scoter year.

We didn't do much woodland birding for several reasons.  Mostly, we realized we'd run out of time if we did, and we were hoping to drive Rutherford Beach before the day ended.  Given the dark overcast, daylight had started late and would end early.  We did decide to try Lighthouse Road because I wanted to see some sparrows and the habitat there seemed like it might be right.  Lighthouse had a little bit of action, enough to make it fun.  There were a few sparrows: White-crowned, White-throated, Savannah, Song, Swamp, and 1 Lincoln's.  It was good to see those birds, but otherwise there wasn't a lot in the woods.

The mudflats of the Sabine were exposed and there were hundreds of shorebirds working them.  It was especially nice to see dozens of Marbled Godwits.

As we headed back east along Holly Beach, we started seeing more hawks.  Red-tailed Hawk numbers aren't as high as they've been in recent years, but some of that might be the result of an increase in predator numbers as the coast recovers from the hurricanes of the past decade.  In the aftermath of those storms, land predators disappeared and rodent numbers skyrocketed.  For a year or two, a birder could see dozens of rats in a day, often feeding fearlessly in the open.  Land animals such as coyotes and bobcats took a few years to recolonize, but aerial hunters were able to fly in enjoy the banquet, and they did. Counts of over a hundred Red-tails were possible along the highway from Cameron to the Texas line for a few years.  Now that coyote and bobcats have returned, rodent numbers have reached equilibrium and hawk numbers are back to normal.

We generally make it a point to get a good look at every hawk we see, because we know it's possible for an oddball to be hidden in the mix.  On the road back, though, it was, "Red-tail," "Red-tail," "Red-tail..." As we neared the village of Holly Beach, we saw 2 Red-tails circling low.  As we got closer, we saw another hawk atop a power pole that turned out to be the object of the Red-tails' scorn.  The bird was clearly larger than the redtails, but by the time we'd pulled over and come to a stop, we were even with the bird and looking up its rear end, not the best view for an ID.  We could see a solid brown back and a whitish head, and as I backed up, we were both pretty sure a better view would show us a Ferruginous Hawk.

Sure enough.  Ferruginous Hawks are birds of the Interior West that are rare in Louisiana but have been recorded with increasing regularity in the past few years.  These are large hawks, but despite their size, they're incredibly graceful on the wing.  This bird put on a show for us, hovering and diving to earth, flying back to the pole, then repeating the whole show.  Needless to say, we appreciated it.  It reminded me in turn of an eagle, a kite, and a harrier.

After a while, the hawk took a dive and stayed on the ground out of sight, so we got back on the road.  We hit the ferry just as it was arriving, and had a nice flock of terns to pick through looking for different birds.  Most were Forster's Terns, but we did see a couple of Common Terns.  Although some of the Forster's Terns are showing speckled dark crowns connecting their black eye patches at this time, the Commons showed a more solid black crown.  An easier mark to spot was the dark bar along the front top edge of their wings.  

The rest of the day was largely uneventful.  We visited Rutherford Beach, but it was already growing dim and there wasn't much to see.  

It was a good day.  Without many stops we managed 99 species for Cameron Parish and saw some interesting stuff.  The highlight was definitely the raptor show.  In addition to the Ferruginous Hawk, we had Red-tailed Hawk, Osprey, White-tailed Kite, Northern Harrier, Sharp-shinned Hawk, Cooper's Hawk, Bald Eagle, Merlin, Kestrel, Peregrine Falcon, and Crested Caracara.  An even dozen.  Not bad for a harsh, windy day.   

P.S. Forgive any errors--I'm watching the Saints and typing between plays.  Jimmy Graham! First down!

Nov. 29-Dec. 1, SWLA

It was too bad that Thanksgiving week had to end, but it ended fairly well.  On Friday, I got some new tires and took a ride to see how they felt.  I did a little birding while I was out.  It was nice to see some winter birds, including some Horned Larks and Lapland Longspurs.

These birds can be hard to spot and even harder to get good photos of, so I was happy to get some that were even recognizable.  

Saturday Dave Patton took me along for a boat trip down the Calcasieu ship channel and out into the nearshore Gulf.  Birds were plentiful, with great numbers of shorebirds working rocks exposed by the low tide.  There were also good numbers of gulls, including my first Bonaparte's Gulls of the season.  We also had a Glaucous Gull on the rocks and then again out of the channel mouth, feeding on a big dead fish floating in the rip line where the dirty channel water met the green gulf water.  

On Sunday, I got up early and watched the birds wake up in the recently freeze-blasted yard.  A nice addition to the yard for the winter was an adult male Rufous Hummingbird feeding on the "ugly shrimp plant." Seeing such a vividly colored male reminded of the days when this species was so uncommon in the area that Lafayette birders would make special trips to see them when they appeared in town.  I hope this bird sticks around to brighten up the yard.    

A little while later, David Muth showed up to join me for a drive around the ag prairie between Lafayette and Lake Charles. We had a nice day list, starting with good numbers of Lapland Longspur, Horned Lark, and Sprague's Pipits in Acadia Parish.  In Calcasieu Parish we stopped to look at some grackles and noticed a group of hawks working in the distance.  We also noticed that one of the hawks had a white tail.  Luckily an angry caracara was harassing this bird, so it was easy to keep tabs on it until it drifted out of sight.  We stayed in the area until we had good enough (but really terrible) pictures to document the bird, a great-looking adult White-tailed Hawk.  This species has gone from drop-everything rare to more regular appearances in the past 20 years, but adult birds are a small part of the mix, and they're pretty stunning.

 There were plenty of Red-tailed Hawks in the area, as well.

A Green Heron that looks likely to stay for the winter also made itself visible.  

We also visited a Say's Phoebe that's been around near Holmwood, saw Bald Eagles and Crested Caracaras in a couple of locations, had a Swainson's Hawk, got nice looks at a Bobwhite, had a little flock of crisp-looking adult White-crowned Sparrows, watched rails and sparrows flushing ahead of a rice combine, and had great weather to boot.  

In butterfly news, we also had a flyby Mourning Cloak, which is pretty uncommon locally.  It was probably about my fifth for SWLA.  

So, a sad farewell to Thanksgiving week...but X-mas will be here soon.  

11/27/13

We just took a trip to see some snow, but now it’s good to be back in Lafayette.  Magpies, crossbills, and Ferruginous and Rough-legged hawks were great to see, but when I got back home I was surprised at how excited I was to see mockingbirds around the neighborhood.  I hope the rest of the Thanksgiving break allows a chance to drive to the Gulf and see some of the sparrows and other winter birds that have arrived during the month. If not, I’m sure I’ll have a great time seeing whatever the backyard has to offer.  At the beginning of the year, I decided that I'd spend more time enjoying common birds, and I have.  After a summer that seemed to last forever, I'm especially ready to see the birds that are signs of the winter season. 

Good times afield, all!                 

Cameron, 11/02/13

Dave Patton and I took advantage of the great weather today to make a trip to the coast.  The north wind was a bit strong, and that cut down on viewing opportunities, but it also brought in a lot of our winter birds. The number of Yellow-rumped Warblers, Savannah Sparrows, geese, Pine Warblers, and White Pelicans on the coast was an impressive sign that last night was a big arrival night.  A lot of individuals were found outside of their normal habitat, or coming back in off the gulf after overshooting the coast in the night.

There were a few Franklin's Gulls mixed in with the Laughing Gulls on Holly Beach, but not a lot of larger gulls to pick through.  The tide was way out, and the north wind was pushing it even farther, but the number of birds on the beach was fairly low.

Near Constance Beach we saw a large black bird flying along the highway, and we stopped to get a better look.  Any crow-like bird down there should be checked out to make sure it's not a raven, but this one turned out to be a crow, the first crow I've seen in that area since Hurricane Rita.  Sometimes birds explore for new turf, sometimes they just end up in the wrong place.  It's hard to say which is which sometimes. Examples are the Red-headed Woodpecker that turned up last month in Peveto Woods, and the Tufted Titmouse that turned up there last week.  In past years odd birds like Carolina Chickadee and Pileated Woodpecker have popped up there, far from their nearest population.  Squirrels have turned up there in the past as well, although they may have been released there by humans.  You never know.

Weather like today's sometimes brings flights of Brown Creepers and Golden-crowned Kinglets, but the only hint of that today was a creeper in the oaks of Peveto.  These camouflaged birds move around like woodpeckers, blending in well with the bark of trees.

A few late migrants were around, including 2 Eastern Wood Pewees and 2 Black-throated Green Warblers.

One of the pewees was wearing a partial tail; is it up to the rest of its migration?  

At Lighthouse Road, across the channel from Texas, there wasn't much action.  Part of the reason may have been the Peregrine Falcon that used the lighthouse as its perch and spent most of its time terrorizing the local birds.  I watched it chase a dove that barely escaped by reaching one of the few patches of woods in the marsh there.  

Dave has always been interested in butterflies, but lately he's been spending more time studying them.  There were certainly plenty to see today, including the first good flight of Monarchs I've seen this fall.  As with the birds, the wind made viewing tough, but there were a few cooperative ones in sheltered spots.    

Stores on the Cameron coast have some strange flavors of chips.  I like to try them all.  One flavor that I bought today was so horrible that I couldn't eat them.  I tried to feed them to this fellow on the ferry, a veteran beggar that will usually eat anything you offer.  He ate one, but looked at the second one, looked at me, and walked off.  If a Great-tailed Grackle won't eat it, it's bad.   

In Cameron, we spotted a Bald Eagle overhead that looked like the same bird that James and Rrik Beck had shown us pictures of a few hours before in Peveto.  If it is the same, it was moving west to east, the opposite of most of the migrating raptors.  

Other birds of interest today several Scissor-tailed Flycatchers, 5 Vermilion Flycatchers, about 200 migrating White Pelicans, a Vesper Sparrow, and a continuing Say's Phoebe near Holmwood.  My favorite bird of the day was a Rufous/Allen's Hummingbird at Peveto.  We found it feeding in the oaks, picking bugs out of the air.  Dave later noted it using lantana and vervain in the Sanctuary.  

A beautiful day to be out, and always something interesting to see.  November is off to a good start.    

Listing Apathy

If you look just to the right on this page, you'll see the little handful of lists I've managed to continue caring about.  The list used to be longer, 20 years or so ago.  At that time I still cared about my North American list, which was probably at about 600 then.  You'll notice that list is nowhere to be seen.  I stopped caring about that one a long time ago.

My Louisiana list has been on 399 for a while now, back since last December.  It only got to 399 because Michael Seymour found a Mountain Plover and I found out that nobody had gotten good photos of it yet.  I knew it'd be a shame to let a first state record get lost because of lack of documentation, so I went to help out. Honestly though, as cool as that bird was and as good as it was to help make sure it got to the state list, I was disappointed to leave my CBC territory for it. 398 is just as good as 399.

Now there are 3 Brown Boobies that birders have staked out near Lake Charles. Somehow none of the pelagic trips I've gone on have turned one of those up, and even a Florida Keys trip failed to produce them in regular spots.  Brown Booby would be a lifer for me, and number 400 for my state list.  However, I really can't bring myself to care.  I don't plan to go see them.

We all have borrowed birds on our lists.  To get to 400 in Louisiana you have to have about 20-30 of them. If you don't have a yard, you've probably borrowed someone's Broad-tailed, Calliope, Anna's, or Broad-billed hummers.  Unless you're one of a lucky handful, you might've borrowed Greater Flamingo, Mountain Bluebird, Tropical and Couch's Kingbird, Cassin's Sparrow, Red Crossbill, Gray Flycatcher, Sage Thrasher, Harris's Hawk, Lark Bunting, Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher, Fork-tailed Flycatcher, Iceland Gull, Yellow-green Vireo, Chestnut-collared Longspur. Those are just some of the chaseable birds of the past decade.  Go back another decade, and another, and your borrowed list inevitably grows.  Borrowed birds are the difference between a list in the 380's and one at 400.

I guess I'm just not interested in borrowing birds anymore.          

Once, I actively avoided chasing birds.  A Rock Wren was a few miles away for most of a winter.  I passed. A Painted Redstart was in a woodlot along the way to the coast for a winter.  I passed--literally--many times that winter on the way to the coast.  If I counted up all the birds I've passed on, I'm guessing they'd bring me to 410.  I can't think of many birds I really chased in the classic sense, frantically racing down the highway.  Black-tailed Godwit, yes.  Blue-throated Hummingbird, yes, and Northern Wheatear before that. I really wanted to see the Greater Flamingo, too.  Many of the borrowed birds on my list are only there because I was invited along for the ride: King Eider, Purple Sandpiper, Mangrove Cuckoo, Red-throated Loon...

Nowadays, I guess I only passively avoid chasing birds.  I just don't find it very exciting:  Show up.  See bird. e-Bird. Tick total up one number.  Watch name climb list.

I'm not knocking it for others, but for me, it doesn't live up to the excitement of lucking onto a new bird unexpectedly.  Live long enough, and you'll find it for yourself.  

It's easy to get caught up in the numbers game, hearing someone else's number and trying to catch up or stay ahead.  That's human nature.  It's envy at its finest.  But really, what's the point?  I watch birds for the same reason I fish or hunt.  It gets me out there.  It reminds me that the sky is better than the ceiling.  It relaxes me. It  fills the space in me that religion fills in others.  Mixing competition up with that seems like sacrilege.

Competitive birding makes about as much sense to me as competitive praying.

That opinion might not find favor with everyone, especially folks who chased the mockingbird and chased the rail and chased the sandpiper and found them...right where the latest post said they'd be.  Remember this, though: I'm not knocking it for others.  I'm just saying that birds on a tee aren't for me.  Anyway, how my opinion makes you feel is a function of you, not me.  It's an opinion, not a command to agree.  

So will my listing apathy keep me from 400?  Who knows.  I don't expect to live much longer, so passing up the gimmes might just keep me from it.  But then again, what's it matter?

Winter in the air

With cooler weather coming on, it’s fun to look at past winters and wonder what this one will bring (for the sake of a one word term, I’ll lump fall and winter together under the latter name).  Last winter produced an amazing 4 first state records: Dusky-capped Flycatcher, Pacific Loon, Mountain Plover, and Razorbill.  The winter before was less productive in terms of first state records (only one: Prairie Falcon), but was spectacular in the sheer numbers of rarities, highlighted by a bizarre invasion of Green-tailed Towhees.  That winter also produced second state record Gray Flycatcher and Brewer’s Sparrow.  It was truly a cornucopia, a Blind Pig year when rarities became the norm.   

Looking at this year compared to past years through the end of September, the species counts were as follows:     

2013     358 species

2012     357

2011     365

2010     351

2009       355

By the end of these years, the species counts had climbed from anywhere from 8-16 birds.   

2013     ?

2012     365 

2011     377

2010     367

2009       364

2013 ranks 2^nd highest among the 5 years through September, and it’ll be entertaining to see how high it climbs.  This year has seen one of the nicest batch of rarities ever (the aforementioned Razorbill, plus Iceland Gull, Connecticut Warbler, Fork-tailed Flycatcher, several Black Rails, et cet.), so much so that normally great birds like Townsend’s Warblers, Chestnut-collared Longspur, and Rough-legged Hawk were somewhat eclipsed. 

What will winter 2013 bring?  We’ll see. 

And by the way…some of you wondered about the birds I posted in a recent post.  Here’s a rundown:

Lesser Goldfinches.  They don’t seem like they should be rare, but they are.  The most recent Louisiana record was a bird that spent several months in Sabine Parish in 2011.  It was a lot more colorful than these birds, which might easily escape notice.    

Hooded Oriole.  This would be a nice treat at a hummer feeder on a cold winter day.  Look for the graduated tail feathers, and the longish bill.  In general, any time an oriole shows up in the winter, snap a photo.  

Costa’s Hummingbird.  There aren’t any records for Louisiana, but there should eventually be.  How many poorly seen green and white hummers might have been Costa’s?  Be sure to snap photos of mystery hummers, and pay special attention to the primaries.  Costa's can have tapered wingtips (like a Ruby-throat), but their primaries are all the same width. 

None of these photos were taken in Louisiana, unfortunately.  

It's a...?

Many years ago I noticed and remarked upon (in the LOS News, I think) one of the hummingbirds in Audubon's Ruby-throated Hummingbird watercolor, said to have been painted in Louisiana in the 1820s. At the time, the bird seemed to me to be a good candidate for a Black-chinned Hummingbird.  That would possibly make it a first Louisiana record, and more interestingly the image would predate the description of the species by a couple of decades.

I was recently looking through my book of Audubon watercolors and noticed this bird again.  I decided to scan the plate using a more modern scanner than what I had back in the '90s.  The image quality is limited by the printing process, but the outer primary of the bird is tolerably clear.  To my eyes, the outer web of the outer primary still looks like it widens more than it would on a Ruby-throat.  Hummingbird banders that can see the differences with their eyes closed would have a more valuable opinion than mine, of course.  It would also help to see the original watercolor, which I don't guess I ever will...

Keep in mind that Audubon had a keen eye and mind for minor details, as evidenced by his observation of the rough wing on a Rough-winged Swallow.  Also keep in mind the fact that this image is not a copy of an engraving, but of the original watercolor.  In other words, this is a copy of the image that Audubon made by hand, not of a second generation product.

What will winter bring?

With fall and winter on the horizon, it's time to start thinking about birds that might turn up in the backyard.  Even with good long looks, a few possibilities pose ID challenges.  Life would be great if all of the birds that turn up at our feeders were well-marked adult males.  The odds argue against that, so there's plenty to keep us on our toes.  Consider the following:

The birds above are so drab that if you notice them at all, they might make you wonder if they're worth a second look.  Are they?    

The yellow bird above isn't well-marked, but once winter arrives, some "drab" birds will actually look pretty bright if they pop up in the yard.  That alone would warrant a second look at this bird, if the fact that it's hanging out on a hummingbird feeder doesn't.  What's the most important thing to look at on this bird?

Green and white female-type hummingbirds are always fun.  If you're lucky enough to get a good look, there are a few things to size up when narrowing down an ID.  Sometimes it takes a good study of a photo to get the ID right.  Bill size, the shape and pattern of the tail, and the shape and size of wing feathers can all provide a good clue.  Is a green and white hummer a big deal, or just a Ruby-throat?