Rusty Blackbird at Santa Ana NWR

I don't have any photo editing software right now, so these are full frame and not enhanced.  It was a dull and dreary afternoon at Santa Ana NWR - at least weather-wise it was.  The rain held off, and we were able to relocate one of the Rusty Blackbirds reported yesterday and refound this morning.  The location was originally Willow Lake #1, the small pond on the tram loop.  After JD arrived, it moved to the dike separating Willow Lake #1 from Willow Lake #2.  

This bird has a pale eye, rufous fringes on the tertials and flight feathers, and a thin bill compared to a female Brewer's Blackbird.  Note also the habitat selection as the area is a brushy swamp, quite different from the typical Brewer's Blackbird habitat in the Lower Rio Grande Valley (feed lots and big box store parking lots).  

Thanks to those that found it and reported it!  

Horned Lark - McCook, Hidalgo County

Thayer's Gull, Brownsville Landfill, 2/14/2015

I went to the dump (excuse me, the Brownsville Sanitary Landfill) on 2/14 mostly because I could. There are very few dumps that allow birders access into the landfill, and I always enjoy the time I spent sorting through the gulls.  Others had found a Thayer's Gull earlier in the week, so I had my eyes peeled for a large, Herring Gull-sized first winter gull.  Here's the Thayers as I first saw it.  It looks massive compared to the Laughing Gulls.  There are some Herring Gulls behind it, and it still looks larger than I would  have expected for an Iceland Gull.  This bird is on the pale end of Thayer's Gull, yet to me it is too large and the secondary bar is too dark for an Iceland Gull.  

 I was entertained by the Thayer's Gull flying around chasing other gulls and returning to the same area in good light.  Note the darker outer webs to the primaries.  It was fairly windy so the gull was flying slowly (almost at stalling speed into the  wind) which made in flight photos easier to get.

It ended up close to the car, but not  near any Herring Gulls.  I guess that would have been asking too much!  If you go to the dump, go when it hasn't rained recently, take a high clearance vehicle, and stay out of the way of the trucks - both the workers and the dump trucks.  It's a rare treat to be allowed into a working landfill these days.

Lesser Black-backed Gulls, Brownsville Sanitary Landfill, Brownsville CBC

I took advantage of the Brownsville CBC to bird at the Brownsville Sanitary Landfill (aka the dump).  Since I was asked for photos of the Lesser Black-backed Gulls and am temporarily unable to crop or edit pics I decided to post them here.  Here's a mob of hungry gulls.  

And here's two Lesser Black-backed Gulls.  I'm the first to admit one isn't 100% identifiable here, but the dark first winter to the right of the adult Lesser (that slaty colored bird on the left) is a Lesser as well.  

And here's another bird. I had five total individuals for the CBC, with distinctive plumage features or age differences from the other birds.  

Phil Ziegler's TUFTED FLYCATCHER

Found and photographed by Phil Ziegler at Padre Island National Seashore at 4:33 PM Tuesday 4/22. The location is near the "Oak Tree" area.  Thanks to Phil for permission to post these photos here.  The photos are reduced in size but otherwise not manipulated.  Watch for a link to more pictures on his Flickr site shortly!

Wordless Wednesday - Hook-billed Kite female

Hook-billed Kites - Mission Hike and Bike Trail - January 21, 2014

The Hook-billed Kite is one of my favorite LRGV birds.

Wait, let me try that again.

The Hook-billed Kite is one of my favorite birds.

We've been in the middle of a prolonged drought in the LRGV and the kites have nearly disappeared along with their food source, the Rabdotus snail. I'm starting to see more snails around, and the odd kite has been reported, most recently by Bill Supulski and Dottie Laminolara.

But imagine my surprise to see five - FIVE - Hook-billed Kites together while I was walking on the Mission Nature Park hike and bike trail today.  (Directions - From US 83 go south on Conway to the signed Mission Nature Park; park and walk west under the high power lines that cross the trail; I had the kites in the next 1/4 mile, on the north of the hike and bike trail - I went walking up the orange signed bike trail).  Don't get me wrong, most of my views were of this sort, with the birds high and distant.  If you squint a little, you can see they are Hook-billed Kites.  OK, maybe if you squint a LOT.  

The black morph is the one I've seen the least of, it's very rare.  Bill Clark found a black morph nesting nearby in Bentsen that fledged a dark chick in 2002.  It's nice to think this could be the same bird or related to one of those birds, but we'll never know with certainty. 

 The females have a golden collar across the hind neck and rufous barring on the breast. This one jumped with a snail, I feel bad about having startled these birds, though it's debatable which of us jumped higher, and I can vouch for a vastly increased heart rate too! 

Here's the less barred male, which is similar in plumage to the male that nested in western Hidalgo County in 2010 and 2011.  Can anyone identify what's in its bill? I was surprised to see it was carrying something, and that it wasn't a snail in a shell. 

I'm very interested in additional reports of these birds. I had two females, two males, and a black morph bird.  The males were  different in appearance, and your careful attention to breast color (red in females, gray in males) and barring thickness and pattern (one male boldly barred in addition to the one above) as well as the black morph that is, well, black.