Sunday 16 March
Stay-at-home day. Campsite home, of course. Tomorrow
will probably be the same. We went for a morning walk to the day use area and
the interpretive trail, but saw no turkeys or other wildlife. But I did at
least get a great look and listen to a yellow-throated warbler.
Then it was off to the bird blind for me. When I arrived a man and woman were doing a bird exercise with their two kids. But they soon left it to me. Nothing exciting but at least I got an exceptionally good study on Pine Siskins and Lesser Goldfinches, both birds I don't have at home. (Other people have siskins, but I never do. Dunno why). Later I caught a sage thrasher and of course the Vermilion Flycatchers that seem to be pretty common here. And earlier, a ladder-backed woodpecker. Lots of chipping sparrows in the campsite.
Pine Siskin
A man joined me and we spoke for a minute. He said he'd been hoping to see a canyon towhee, and I had to admit that there had been a pair of them at the campsite the previous day and they hung around so long I practically had to step on them to get in the door. Later, when I went back, there they were at the neighbor's camp. Too bad I didn't just take him back and show him them. They're hard to see, until you do--and then you see them constantly. Strange birds. Very "tame" in campgrounds.
He also mentioned that a birder in Lara's Blind (there are four bird blinds in this campground) had seen a Rufous-backed Robin. I consulted my book and decided that was very unlikely--it's an extremely rare visitor from Mexico to extreme South Texas. So I didn't go look for it. My mistake--a few days after we returned from the trip I found out that it was real and that multiple people had seen it, at more than one location in the area. Stupid me!!!
Merlin kept hearing an Inca Dove but I never got it.
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