Birding – Page 5 – State of Wilderness

Hill Country Highways: Burnet, Durn it, Episode 5: One Year Anniversary

I am standing in a pitch black field. The darkness soaks up my coat and pants, and I can barely make out my bare hands. Dark sky protocol dictates that the only lights out here are four infrared bulbs: two marking the path, and two marking the edge of the shed that housed the telescopes that made up this observatory. A thin layer of clouds moved across the sky, blocking out the light from the moon and the stars. I am reminded of the poet Jim Morrison’s words: “Out here, there are no stars to guide us”.

The only glimmer of light was a tendril of bright far in the horizon, towards the city of Austin that lay about one hour drive southwest. “See that?”, he says in my ear, pointing towards the light, although I could barely make out his hand. “That’s light pollution”. I am not sure if I am saddened or comforted by the sight, as I try to become comfortable with the inky black. Civilization makes it mark on the land, but it also seems to represent safety. So many dangers could be lying in wait in the field.

Just last night, I almost was a danger to others, standing in the parking lot of the nearby resort, also under dark light protocol. I had a cart in front of me, and was wearing a blue coat, but it all blended into the darkness so well that a man nearly tripped over my cart until I moved it and coughed, frightening him. I feel a little frightened now of what I can’t see; snakes, feral hogs, bobcats, all those creatures we saw scat and tracks of earlier on the trail.This must be how the night felt to the pioneers, and I try to imagine what it was like to have to make your way on your own through this forest, back when there were even more animals and dangers in the darkness. I wonder how many accidental deaths this blackness has been responsible for. At the same time, though, it is thrilling to just stand there in the field, blending in, until I feel like I am a part of this outdoor landscape, and not a stranger to it.

Just a few minutes before, we finished watching the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field 3D video, in which it feels like one is coasting through space. We watched this inside the shed of the observatory, where two members of the Austin Astronomical Society gave us an hour long presentation on the wonders of telescopes and space. We had just contemplated how small and insignificant we are in terms of space and time before I walked out into the field to see what it felt like to stand there on our way out . We would have been able to marvel at the stars and planets through the telescopes, but the weather didn’t cooperate, which is just our dumb luck.
It was last August that I brought you the first four episodes of our Hill Country Highway adventures in and around Burnet, Texas. If the reader remembers, we had felt some frustration over the fact that we spent an entire weekend out in a cabin in Lake Buchanan in anticipation of a special Vanishing Texas River Cruise called “Freedom Flight” that ended up being cancelled. We tried to schedule a time to go again later in the year, but ended up canceling our reservations in order to have the money for our wedding. I was still a little disappointed, but my parents offered to watch the kids this November so we could take the “Freedom Flight” cruise on an anniversary weekend.
Months ago, I secured the tickets for this special boat ride, offered just a handful of times during the year, in which rehabilitated raptors are brought on board to be released back into the wild during the boat ride. The lucky guests who have their number drawn will get to the be the person who holds the bird for their big release. I also made reservations at the Canyon of the Eagles Resort, a place very close to the boat dock that we decided we wanted to stay at one day after having breakfast there last year.
Two days before we were set to leave, we got a phone call – the boat cruise was canceled, again. The lake levels were too low. Looking out at Lake Buchanan, one can see what they mean. Even though this year is not a drought year, there is a vast distance between where the edge of the lake has been in the past, and where it is now. When they call this particular boat line the Vanishing Texas River Boat Cruise, it almost seems like a cruel joke. It is vanishing, right before our eyes.
In fact, the website for the “eco-adventure” company that advertised canoe, kayak rentals and guided tours out of this area now just leads to an unclaimed domain name. No one is renting watercraft from the shores near the resort, as it would be a long hike through the brush now to get to the lake, which is basically dried up to the Colorado River now, which used to run through its middle.
Anyways, Canyon of the Eagles Resort has a seven day cancellation policy, which meant it was too late to back out of the weekend now, despite the prediction of bad weather. It was hinted on the weather channel that there might even be snow, so this had us packing layers, gloves, hats, and preparing for the possibility of being holed up at the resort.
The resort is really a collection of four-plex cabins surrounding an inner courtyard, which contains a swimming pool, a rec room, a bar, a fire pit, and then a chef-led restaurant with a fireplace outside of it, which provides a good gathering place to show outdoor movies or host a live band. The rooms at this rustic lodge do not have TVs in them, because they want to encourage you to go out and enjoy the great outdoors. The resort boasts a “big backyard” to play it – it is surrounded by a 940 acre nature park, with fourteen miles of trails. Inside the park boundaries, down a long dirt road, is the afore-mentioned observatory, which hosts “star parties” most weekend nights at dusk. There are also nature programs, such as the “Shake, Rattle and Roll” snake program that was happening on Saturday.
Here a couple of pictures from the grounds:

The weather actually ended up being better than anticipated, so we were able to go out and play. These are the things we enjoyed over the weekend: road burritos from Buccee’s, hiking and geocaching at both the Canyon of the Eagles Park and Inks Lake State Park, cheeseburgers at Hoover Valley Cafe, a visit to the fish hatchery, birdwatching, a fabulous breakfast buffet and later romantic dinner at the Overlook Restaurant at the resort, a late afternoon nap, an astronomy program at the park’s observatory, a slow walk through the damp trails after a fresh rain on Sunday morning, chocolate truffles, more birdwatching, more geocaching, and a stop at Storm’s Drive-In in Burnet for breakfast.
Here is a video of what the bird song was like at Canyon of the Eagles Park (which, although on the same grounds as the resort, is managed by the LCRA and is a birding hotspot): if you can hear it

This is a list of the birds we saw over the weekend:
Redtail Hawk
several unidentified hawks
Turkey Vulture
Black Crested Titmice
Ladder backed Woodpecker
American Crow
Chipping Sparrow
Cedar Waxwing (possibly)
Long billed Curlew
Bald Eagle (immature)
Savannah Sparrow
Greater Roadrunner
Northern Cardinal
One unidentified sparrow – either Song, Bachmans, or White Crowned
Carolina Chickadee
Ground and Mourning Doves
Common Raven

On the way home: Crested Caracara in Brenham, Red-Shouldered Hawk and Killdeer in Marble Falls
With some other species sightings the past few months (Mississippi Kite, Spotted Sandpiper, Ruby Throated Hummingbird, the two adult bald eagles), that brings our yearly species count up to 121.

We also found fourteen geocaches. My favorites were the ones in Inks Lake (some of which I have been wanting to see since 2007), and a travel bug hotel in someone’s front yard inside a plastic fire hydrant. Here are some of my favorite pictures from the weekend:

I don’t regret going at all, even though it was a real bummer that the Freedom Flight was cancelled again. I am beginning to wonder if we will ever be able to do this boat ride, and we are starting to not care about it anymore.

Also, with the “Romance Package” we had booked, I feel like we probably paid a lot more for the weekend that I had intended us to. I agreed to the package because it seemed like it would save us some money on pet fees and the meals we ate there, but it probably cost us $10-20 over what we would have spent (but then again, we never used our drink coupons, so if we had, we might feel like we came out even). We probably won’t spend that kind of money on other anniversaries, but maybe just for special milestones. With a new baby on the way, it might be a while until we can sneak off for a weekend getaway without children for some years, at any rate.

The food at the Overlook was awesome, but I think I ate too much of it, because I had a stomach ache for a few days after. It is probably because Jason and I insisted on trying to finish our huge complimentary desserts.

The park was nice, and I want to come back another time, perhaps to camp instead someday, and perhaps with the kids sometime, so they can experience the observatory as well. We had a really good time, and I am sure we will treasure the memory as the years go by.

San Marcos: Purgatory Creek Natural Area and Prospect Park

I think I am turning green after this weekend..green with envy over this sweet, sweet setup my best friend growing up has got going on over there in the smtx. Not only does she have this great big yard that is part elevated open green space for the kids to play/part wilderness, but she also has this super awesome natural area walking distance from her house that offers a “greenbelt” with nature trails and the chance to experience an endangered species: the Golden Cheeked Warbler. This little bird has experienced so much habitat loss of the places it likes to nest in – tall juniper and oak woodlands – because of urban development that it hasn’t got a lot of places left, but this greenbelt is a protected space to hold back just a bit of this prime real estate for this brightly colored little bird to lay its eggs.

We didn’t see any of the warblers out during our two forays into the natural area over the weekend, but perhaps they were busy doing their nesting thing, which extends until the end of this next week. We might have heard them; there were unidentified bird sounds going on around us. Truth be told, we didn’t stop much to lift the binoculars, because we were too busy watching the rocks on the trail and/or our phone/gps to see where the geocaches were in the park. We were excited about the chance to see them, though, the opportunity that could happen at any time.

We did see a bit of other birds, butterflies and bees on our walks, as well as whole herds of mossies (that we could have done without – but the air was humid after a well-needed rain so that is just as well).

To be fair, I am not really feeling envious as much as I am feeling motivated to find a situation like hers. We were inspired enough to draw out some plans for our yard to allow more outdoor appreciation time in our own space. We really liked sitting on my friend’s porch on adirondack chairs watching the numerous birds flitting and flying about the trees and cacti in their yard. Several common nighthawk (#89) searched the tops of the trees for food in the evening, and in the morning, sparrows and cardinals, as well as other birds sang bright little morning songs. We saw our first hummingbird of the year flitting around a flower in her neighbor’s yard (I am not sure what species it was; it was too fast to identify). We want to build on the bird bath/bird feeder concept at our own house to draw them into our yard like that, although it certainly won’t be as spectacular as her yard is.

Of course, they also have the San Marcos River so close to their house – another reason to be jealous. We all loaded up the tubes and took them down to spend about an hour floating along. We saw some ducks on the river. One was a drake who stood up tall and stretched his wings, and I have been trying to figure out what he was. He looked like a Mallard but he was mostly black, and I am wondering if it is one of the Mallard x Black Duck crosses “they” talk about occasionally. There was a female with chicks that was possibly a female Wood Duck.

The river was very clear, clean, and cool. My youngest kept wanting to get off his tube and swim in it near us, and we let him do that sometimes when it was convenient for us. I felt the urge as well, and at the end, I did get to take a swim, but mostly to try to catch up to my oldest one, who had gotten ahead and needed to be told to stop.

There was so much good outdoor adventure on our trip, and some little places here and there that called to us that we didn’t have time to explore, so we do plan on going back. We also had a really nice time visiting with my friend Mari and her family, and the kids got along really well. I have already been looking at our calendar to see when we could fit in a return trip (although it probably won’t be until next year). If we go there again in March through May, perhaps we can lay our eyes on those Golden Cheeked Warblers after all.

Michigan moments

I had been in Texas in the morning, Georgia midday, Illinois early afternoon, then driven through Indiana to here, near Kalamazoo, Michigan.

I was on a mission; I have been trying to fill in my calendar on gc.com of days I have found a cache, and this was a day I needed. Finally I had a minute to take a short walk in the evening and see what I could find.

I came upon a herd of deer, about a dozen altogether. They were grazing in a field about five hundred feet from the hotel, just across the street from where I needed to look for the cache. A couple of young ones in the herd were curious about what I was doing, and turned to watch me. One couldn’t stand it, and finally had to cross the street and make attempts to graze at the grass near me, watching me. I tried to see if he would let me approach him (foolish girl – but he didn’t have antlers with which to gore me, and I was curious how close he would let me get), but this only resulted in the whole herd taking off for the safety of the woods, as if I meant to hurt them.

I didn’t find that cache, but I did find one on the other side of the hotel. I saw several Canadian Geese (#86) honking in the grass along the way, and the morning I saw them again in the back of the hotel.

This is the view from the back of the hotel in Portage. I didn’t get to explore much because I was sort of at the mercy of the sales guys, who had the car. I spent some time here, though, armed with binoculars to see what I could see. Most of what I saw were the same birds I had been seeing in Texas, except for a pair or two of Mallards (#87) that flew low near the trees on their way to some other water source. There were blackbirds, robins, and sparrows out there, others too that I can’t think of right now.

In the drive through Indiana, though, I had looked over and seen a glorious site of several sandhill cranes covering a field of beaten down golden stalks of some crop, probably corn. I also saw cliff swallows (#88) that had made a mud nest along the front of the building of the client we had come to visit. I thought I would have a chance for more wildlife observations when we returned to Chicago, but we stayed in an area full of tall buildings, and clubs and restaurants.

As much as it is nice to get away, it was also really nice to come home, return to my boys and my bike and the gorgeous spring we are having this year.

Cinco Ranch Nature Trail #4 – The Darn Dog

“Daddy, did you hear that dog?” said the little girl who had just passed us on her bike to her father next to her. “Yes, I did,” he said.

I was not surprised. I bet everyone at the lake last night heard my dog. The little girl was referring to the whining he was doing when they passed us, similar to the whining he did every time we switched directions, stopped for a second, saw another dog, got passed by a jogger. Somebody needs to either get out more, get more exercise, get his nuts removed, get a shock collar, or be worked with more on calming the eff down. He was driving me crazy, and not contributing to my goal of simmering down from the work week and releasing the stress headache I had going on.

Also, he does not make a good birding companion. When I stopped to look with the binoculars at the rich bird life I was seeing along the way, he would whine and tug on the leash, like “let’s go already!”. When I sat down on the grassy creekside to watch the ducks in the special duck place, he could not stand it, fretting and whining and trying to break his down-stay.

In the end, though, he and I (and Breeze, who was a very good girl) got about an hour of exercise, and I ended up being very happy with the walk overall. I discovered that the secret place of ducky delight is even better than I thought. There were all kinds of interesting birds there last night.

Even better than a little cove full of black bellied whistling ducks is a cove full of blue-winged teal. Sure, there were a few whistling ducks there, and probably at night, they do own the place, but this late evening, it was the blue winged teal that had taken over. The whistling ducks look absolutely gigantic next to these smaller, more delicate ducks. My cell phone camera is not great, but you can see the much smaller ducks in the background and the whistling ducks in front.

Also, there were a few more unique birds, like a couple of black necked stilts. A handful of what I believe to be dowitchers fed nearby. There were also a few herons (great blue, little blue, perhaps some unidentified) here and there. Further down the path, by the side of the big lake, I saw a black crowned night heron sitting there unperturbed by my dog’s whining. I also spied a loggerhead shrike perching on a branch, which is the third time this past week that I had a possible shrike in my viewer, so I am counting it. A small bird with a medium bill flitted about on the rocks feeding from the edge of the lake, which I am thinking was a western sandpiper. Red winged blackbirds sang chirpy songs at each other from little trees on the sides of the creek.

My favorite part of last night, though, were the barn swallows. Dozens of them were swooping up and down above the creek that leads to the cove, going back and forth between there and the tunnels that make up the nature trail. Golden bellies flowed below blue wings in a graceful arch up and down that was soothing to watch, but impossible to capture by photograph. Some things you just have to commit to your memory instead.

Earlier this week, I was captivated by some scissor tailed flycatchers who were arguing in and out of a tree at the soccer fields. This is also something I will have to commit to mental memory. I only barely got a good look with the binoculars. That brings my bird total up to 83 for the year.

I am loving the CRNT more and more every time I go to it. I can’t believe I have lived here over three years and am just now discovering it. I am glad I am finally getting over being sick, because it was a bummer to be missing some migration action. Good thing I caught those blue wings now, because they will be gone in a couple of weeks. I am hoping my ankle will start feeling better soon (it’s been giving me some trouble for a few weeks) and we can get back to our bike rides and seeing more birds.