Bird Brain Chronicles – Bob James

Trailing Along

February 1, 2020February 1, 2020 rockyfort

Every week, I do a video introduction to a Bible study I write on my Daily Enduring Truth Blog. This week, I decided to go to the South Texas Botanical Gardens so that I could do the video, and then walk the trails. I’ve generally seen a lot of birds along the trails here. I did the video in the Hummingbird Garden. Most of the flowers weren’t blooming yet and it’s been a little cold for hummingbirds, so we didn’t have the color background I hoped for, nor did we see any hummingbirds. My wife, Lucy, accompanied me and did the video work today. Imagine our surprise near the end of our visit we say the picture of the parrot named Lucy. So, my Lucy posed with their Lucy.

After that, I got a couple of nice scenery shots. I love the view of the creek and the view of the lake. I usually see lots of birds on the lake, but I only saw one today, a cormorant and I couldn’t get any good pictures of it.

As I was leaving the lake, a Great Blue Heron flew past. Today, the birds seemed to be either out of range or they showed up when I wasn’t ready with my camera.

A little bit farther along the trail there’s a bigger lake also. I didn’t get any pictures of the lake, but a few pics of the birds on the lake. As best as I can tell, this is a green winged teal. It’s darker than the ones I saw at the Suter Wildlife Refuge, but the head and the little white chevron in the front were helpful in identifying it. Again, please feel free to corrct me if I’m wrong.

In a tree on the other side of the larger lake, I saw this Loggerhead shrike. Those birds fascinate me, and I love the mask around their face. This was one of the ones that was too far away to get a really good pic.

On the other side of the bridge (used to walk over the marshy, muddy edge of the big lake) I saw this Lesser Yellow Legs. I’ve seen a couple since I started shooting again even though I don’t recall seeing them before this time.

In Texas, you gotta see a mockingbird or two whenever you go out birding…just because. This was one of the few birds I found as I followed a trail close by Oso Creek.

Finally, if you remember, this is a botanical garden. While it was too early for most flowers, we saw a few beautiful flowers. We had planned to go today to take pictures. Just before we left, we got a letter reminding us that we needed to renew our membership. We did so gladly because this is one of the most beautiful spots in the area with both cultivated and natural beauty.

Bird Brain Chronicles, Bird pics and story

Return to the Scene of the Crime

January 31, 2020 rockyfort

Let’s face it…last Saturday’s pics were bad. They were so bad they were criminal…sort of. So, yesterday I returned to the scene of the crime to see if I could get some good pictures. Well, I had another plan as well, but that didn’t pan out too well. The Suter Wildlife Refuge has trails going two ways from the parking lot. One is to the gazebo by the bay where I took pics Saturday, the other is through the trees down to the shore. Since I had gone to the gazebo area before, I started out going to the trees. In the past, I’d seen a lot of songbirds and gotten good pictures along this path. On this day, I saw two birds and didn’t get a chance to take the picture. They were too small, too fast, and rushed for cover.

One reason I didn’t see many birds, I believe, is that the city is doing some work on the Refuge, seeking to create a more native environment. It was pretty noisy. It should be good in the long run. When I got close to the shore, I didn’t see any birds, but I saw a few where I took long range shots. This double crested cormorant, I think that’s right, flew to join his buddies sunning themselves on a rock. Even with cropping, this pic looks a long way off. One of my dreams for this year is to get a longer range lens to use for these shots. I got a few other shots, but they weren’t crisp and clear. So, I walked back to the gazebo. Of course, since I could see the water around the gazebo, I walked quickly. I had seen a whole flock of white pelicans close by!

One of the things that struck me was the beauty created by God just using black and white..well…maybe with a bit of orange accent. In this picture, you can see black skimmers, sea gulls, American avocets, black-necked stilts, and white pelicans. I thought the pelican scratching behind his ear was interesting…thought about my dog when I saw this. While looking at this picture, I noticed the green wing teals behind the pelicans. I looked for them, hoping for a better pic than the other day, but couldn’t find them, that I know of. I wished I’d noticed them while I was there so I could have gotten a better picture.

One of the most beautiful birds on the coast is the black skimmer. It’s black and white, with an orange accent around the beak. It feeds by fying just above the water and dipping it’s beak in the water as it flies along. According to All About Birds, “Possibly the best description of the Black Skimmer’s bounding, head-down foraging style came from the great seabird biologist R. C. Murphy in 1936. He said they look like ‘unworldly… aerial beagles hot on the scent of aerial rabbits.'” I usually see them in large flocks, like those flying to your left, or at the bottom of the picture above. As much as I love the picture with the whole flock rising up in the air at one time, I wish you could experience the beauty yourself.

One of the more humorous, to me incidents of the day was when a brown pelican caught a fish. If you can see the brown pelican, he’s just swallowed the fish. When he first caught it, the seagulls swarmed him, trying to get anything he might drop, or, make him lose the fish. The white pelican came over to help out his fellow peli….or so I imagine. Then, once he swallowed the fish, the other birds pulled back and later he was seen swimming with the gulls following behind like ducklings following their mother. (They attacked any time the pelican found something else to snack on.

Then, finally, this bird. I’m beginning to recognize some birds again. I thought this was either a godwit or a willet, and research leads me to believe that it’s a marbled godwit. (Willets have shorter beaks and longer legs, I think.) He just kept searching the shallows for invertebrates and plant tubers. (See what a little research will tell you!)

All in all, I had a great time on a beautiful day. I plan to do three of these Bird Brain Chronicles posts a week. I’m also trying to work a way to show the full pictures at a larger size so you can see the beauty of these birds. Please feel free to correct anything I said that was wrong, ask questions, or request a site or a bird for me to check out.

Note: I was just about to post this yesterday when I did something stupid and burnt my hand, making it hard to type. Sorry for the delay.

Bird Brain Chronicles, Bird pics and story

January 12 – Lots of Egrets

January 12, 2019 rockyfort

The #BirdBoxChallenge is a big deal these days. Based on the actions of characters in a Netflix movie, people are putting on blindfolds and trying to do normal, everyday tasks. You’d think there’s be limits, of course, because there are some things even the dumbest people won’t do. Like, who could imagine anyone being idiotic enough to drive a car blindfolded. Just won’t happen. Nope. Not here. Not in America….well, maybe. PT Barnum was right: no one ever went broke because they underestimated the intelligence of the American people! Anyway, I bring that up because I want to offer a variation of the Bird Box Challenge. I’m calling it the Bird Brain Challenge. Instead of blindfolding yourself to the fears of our surroundings, open your eyes and notice God’s handiwork in our world today. Look at the beauty and variety we see in people, in plants, in animals, and especially birds. Enjoy this beautiful world that God has made!

As to the pictures today – lots of egrets. There’s a reason. I’m actually going to link a picture back to my facebook photo album so you can see the whole sequence of an amazing egret battle! But, first things first. We were at the South Texas Botanical Gardens and Nature Center today. Lucy walked with me. We didn’t see the variety of birds we usually see, but we saw that amazing egret battle. The first bird we saw, though, was an Inca dove with it’s distinctive pattern on the wings. They used to visit our backyard when we fed the birds, but this is the first one I’ve seen this year.

Then, we saw some birds that were too far off to get good pics. After that, we came to a lake where there were numerous water birds. Most of them were too far off to see too much, but there were some egrets close by. They were photobombed by a darker bird that made me wonder if juvenile egrets are hatched with dark feathers. I late discovered what kind of bird it was, but I’ll save that reveal for later. What we did see was a growing tension among the egrets that led to a great battle between two males, I believe. Finally, one prevailed and chased the other one off, but thee was a bit of a twist in the ending. If you click on the picture of the egrets fighting, you can see the beginning of the fight all the way through. The captions explain the twist.

The darker bird was a juvenile white-faced ibis, if I got the identification right. He kept right on eating through the fight without a care in the world. Front row seats to the premier boxing match of the spring and he kept staring down at his dinner. I would have caught the identification when I looked at the pics later, but a different angle confirmed that it was an ibis.

As we continued on our walk, we saw some beautiful flowers and even a lizard. The last picture of the day was the butterfly below.

It was a great day to be out in God’s world today. It was good to see families and friends walking the trail at the Botanical Gardens. It’s a beautiful place to go. Get yourself a yeary membership and you can go there often and see the beauty of God’s creation in the different stages of the year.

Bird Brain Chronicles, Bird pics and story

January 10 – About Bird Brain Chronicles…and Today’s Pics

January 10, 2019January 10, 2019 rockyfort

So you may have noticed the #BirdBrainChronicles hashtag and the category for Bird Brain Chronicles. “What’s happening?” you ask. This is still the Bob James Author page and I’ll be sharing authory stuff with you when I have it to share. I just wanted a chance to share my hobby/passion for bird photography with people. And, to be honest, I’m looking at ways I can expand this in the future, but this will help me get my feet wet. If you have any questions about photography, the places I choose, or suggestions or ideas, etc. please feel free to note them in the comments. Also, feel free to share links with anyone who might be interested.

Today, I took the advice of a friend I used to teach with when looking for a spot. Only, I remembered part of where she said, not the whole thing, and ended up on the wrong side of the road. I didn’t see any birds I could snap, so after I checked her directions, I started heading back to the right end. Only, due to a military airfield, it wasn’t a straight shot. So, I tried to cut over on a different road. I did see this egret and the cormorant, although the egret was camera shy and flew away as I tried to take her picture.

When I got to the suggested road, I could see how it would have lots of places for birds to hide, but today the places were too good and I couldn’t see any birds worth shooting. (With a camera of course!) So, quite disappointed, I turned towards home. While on the homeward path, I came across this flock of sandhill cranes. There were about a hundred of them in the field. At first I thought they were sheep, then I realized they were the cranes. I took lots of shots, but I’m going to give you a more panoramic view of them rather than pictures of the individual birds. This is what I first saw, but the pics don’t do justice to the birds.

Then, just as I got to the bridge, I spied this osprey. He was so far away I thought he was on top of his kill. When I looked at his pic, I realized that he was on an old tire. While I’m happy that made it possible to see him, I continue to be appalled at the blatant disregard for our world. I look at the beauty of God’s creation in the birds and in the land and the plants. Then, that joy is jarred when I see the litter people leave thoughtlessly: not caring about God’s creatures, the land, or other people who seek to enjoy the land. I’m typing this while out of town right now, but I’m planning to bring along a small sack to pick up trash along the way in the future. I can’t clean the whole area, but I can clean my part.

And that fits in with the Bird Brain concept. While it’s been an insult in the past, science has shown that birds are great problem solvers. While my actions aren’t a permanent solution, they’re a start. God created a beautiful world for us, and we’re called to be his stewards.

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