Today I took advantage of being at the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival to get relatively cheap access to the Norias Area of the King Ranch with Tom Langshied, a full time group leader/Birder for the King Ranch. Along with about 40 others we took a 6 AM bus to the ranch, and targeted everyone’s reason for the trip first thing. This area of the King Ranch is the only reliable place in the ABA area to see Ferruginous Pygmy Owl, and we all managed good looks by about 8:30 AM. The owl looks and acts very much like our familiar Northen Pygmy Owl, but has a more reddish overall color, especially the tail, and its toot if faster and it seems flatter and higher pitch. These photos were digiscoped by a trip member expert digiscoper using my seatmate’s phone. Sue sent me the photos. My digiscope attempts show lots of Texas scrub branches and a brownish blurry blob.
The rest of the trip was definately anticlimactic. We managed to find about 5 Sprague’s pipits, but all were in flight though the birds were calling. They behave very differently from AMPI. When flushed they are almost invariably single birds, no flocks. They fly up in stairstep like fashion, higher and higher and then they drop straight to the ground, today all into deep grassy areas. Their call notes are very different also, resembling a robin’s alarm call note.
Other notable birds on the trip included the Rio Grande race of WITU, Northern Bobwhite (several flocks flushed), Couch’s kingbirds, Great Kiskadee, Vermillian Flycatcher, Green Jay, Olive Sparrow (only heard calling by me, others got brief looks), Harris, White-tailed, and RT Hawks (Fuerte’s race), Merlin, AWPE, and lots of vultures.
We got back a bit after 1 PM, and I took off looking for Aplomado Falcon on the Roads east of Harlington. No luck but the flooded fields yielded several shorebirds, White-faced ibis, and large numbers of AMKE and LOSH along with HAHA, WTHA, PEFA, and Horned Larks.
Kay got back a bit after 4:30 PM and managed brief looks at the WHite-collared sead-eater on her “sojourn.” Mexican for dinner was disappointing, but otherwise a great day.
Trip Lifer’s for Ed= 2 so far.