State of Wilderness

Mother’s Day on the Katy Prairie

For my Mother’s Day present this year, my husband gave me what most mothers probably secretly want (especially mothers of three boys): solitude, peace and quiet, a break from the housework, and a chance to just be myself, by myself.

I had found an opportunity to participate in a nature workshop at one of the sites belonging to the Katy Prairie Conservancy, not normally open to the public (the Indiangrass Preserve). The workshop was called the Wild West Tour: Photographing Wildflowers and Breeding Birds, and it was led by Glenn Olsen, a Master Naturalist. Glenn has over twenty years experience identifying plants and birds, and he shared this knowledge with the group of a dozen or so nature enthusiasts who gathered at the preserve’s headquarters early this Sunday morning.

First we walked along the path to the large pond at the end of the path near the office, and Glenn pointed out all the different types of flowers that were blooming along the path’s edge. I am not usually the one who gets to to operate my husband’s fancy camera, but since we had decided that we 1) didn’t want to fork over $50 per person for both of us to come, and opted to just pay one registration fee and 2) it would have defeated the purpose and taken away from the experience to have to trek the younger kids out with us, and 3) we are too cheap to hire a babysitter, that it made sense for me to just bring his Nikon. I can’t exactly go to a photography workshop without a camera, but we procrastinated so long on making the decision that this was going to be my gift that we never made the time for him to give me a lesson on how to work the camera to get the shots I wanted. At first I was a little frustrated, but I kind of figured it out after a little while of fooling around. I got some shots I wanted (including the ones here in this post, and some more I didn’t post), but I also missed a lot of shots due to poor technique.

After we saw all the different types of the flowers along the path, we wandered behind the buildings to check out the nests of the barn swallows that were flitting about. We saw the marks on leaves where monarch butterflies had been feeding on a “toothache” tree, and learned about which plants are best to encourage butterflies and bees. Glenn pointed out which species were native, and which were invasive, and explained which type of butterfly or insect fed on several varieties as we made our way through the workshop. His knowledge was also pretty extensive regarding the range of common bird species.

About halfway through our time, we divided up into three groups and got into cars to do a driving tour of the Katy Prairie. We stopped at a couple of places along the roads, getting out to get shots of various plants that Glenn elaborated on.

Eventually we made our way to another KPC site, which I think was part of the Nelson Farm section. Here, we saw more wildlife, including big bullfrogs that hopped vigorously into the big lake, huge snakes that slithered into the water out of our site, and more birds. We got some pictures of the pair of Eastern Kingbirds that flitted about. There was a Lesser Yellow Legs that kept flying by that I did not get a picture of, and then we were treated to the rare sighting of a Hudsonian’s Godwit that I also was not able to catch with a camera (but did catch with my binoculars). In the distance, White Faced Ibis flew over the prairie in flocks, settling in the marshes together. We saw pelicans, cormorants, coots, meadowlarks, herons and egrets, as well as the ubiquous Red Winged Blackbirds.

On the way back, there was a nice shot of a Crested Caracara perching on a fencepost, but the people in my car missed the best angle because Glenn had moved his car to allow his passengers to get the shot. One of the guys in my car was mad about this the whole rest of the workshop, and I assured him that if he drove around these back roads long enough, he would find another to get a picture of. Sure enough, on the way home, I had a clear shot of another, who had gotten mixed into a flock of vultures feeding off some cow feet that were mysteriously dumped in front of a pasture gate.

I learned a lot about photography and about nature on this expedition, but I also learned I have a lot left out there to learn about. I also had a great time just being myself (not “Mom”), being completely absorbed in an experience, and spending some time embracing the outdoors. I am going to look for more experiences like this in the future, both guided and unguided.

Here are some of my other photos from today (not all, believe it or not):

High Island: Striking a Balance

Over the weekend, my family and I went out to visit the Houston Audubon’s sanctuaries in High Island, a town at the far eastern end of the Bolivar Peninsula. In the spring, migratory birds traveling from Central and South America who are crossing the Gulf of Mexico in search of their spring breeding grounds sometimes end up stopping here on their journey, hungry and tired after their six hundred mile jaunt over the Gulf, to the delight of birders. In cases of “fallout”, in which strong northern winds and rain slow the birds down, there may be a higher number of migrants that end up in these sanctuaries in the spring months, as they need to stop here to gain strength before flying further inland.

In addition to these neotropic migrants in the spring that attract birders to the area in the months of March-May, there is another attraction: the Rookery at Smith Oaks. Back in the mid-nineties, land was donated to the Houston Audubon by Exxon, including an area where a pond had been dug out to supply water to High Island residents. There is a u-shaped island in this pond that attracted waterfowl to build their nests, and remained even more enticing to them after hunting was outlawed in the area in 1994. By 1995, there were 50 heron nests observed on the island, 332 observed in 1997, and by 2003, 1083 nests were observed. In the hour before sunset, more birds appear as they flock to the island to have a safe place to spend the night. Although there are alligators near the pond who sometimes prey on the birds, the general lack of predators (including human) means that the birds can raise their young in general peace.

I had been wanting to visit the Rookery over the past year or two, since learning about it, because my favorite bird (the Roseate Spoonbill) nests there. Seeing all the pictures on birding pages on Facebook was giving me the itch to check it out, an itch that was so strong that I even had to forgo spending time with my best friend during this weekend when she really wanted to get out of town and escape reality for a little bit. I had floated the idea past her of going to this in addition to the plans she was making, but it seemed like she was not that interested, and my husband wanted to go with me when I went, and we couldn’t figure out how to make that work. Ultimately, I needed him to come with me because he is the one with the camera, a power that he is not quite willing to hand over yet. He is the one who took all the photos in this post (although if he had rented a more powerful lens, like we talked about ahead of time but then he forgot about), we would have even more close-up photos of the action.

In my mind, we were going to spend a peaceful hour strolling slowly through the Boy Scout Woods section, taking pictures of multiple species of warblers, and then spend an hour watching the action at the Rookery and getting pictures of Spoonbills caring for their young. I was thinking about the mosquitoes, we were prepared with several types of bug repellent, but I somehow was not thinking about how the rains of last week would have brought out killer swarms of these noxious pests. Birding reports from High Island last weekend reported that the mossies were not that bad, but we’ve had some time for them to grow since. Instead of an hour at Boy Scout Woods, we spent maybe thirty minutes, and most of that was a little frustrating for me because I asked Jason to lead, and he decided to take us on a venture that lead us deeper into the buggy parts because he wanted to explore the park boundaries, instead of taking us to the more birdy areas of the boardwalk. At the Rookery, we spent a little closer to the time I wanted to spend, and maybe had less mosquitoes to deal with, but I still felt rushed to get through it and missed out on birding opportunities that I wanted to have. For instance, there was a moment where I had stopped with some other birders to focus in on the fluttering in the forest, and we identified an American Redstart together, but then there were two other birds, one of which they identified as a Red-Eyed Vireo, a bird I don’t already have checked off my list this year, but my family was way up ahead of me on the trail, wanting me to hurry up to them so that they could get to the parking lot faster.

This was pretty much the story of our trip to High Island this year: my wanting to stop and identify all these amazing birds I was seeing, and Jason and the two younger boys being ahead of me on the trail going “mom, come on, bugs are biting, hurry up, let’s go”. In the end, I feel like maybe I would have been better off borrowing a camera and going with a friend, and maybe next time, that is what I will do. I am wrestling with how I feel about this, though. In a way, I have a hard time dealing with the guilt if I leave Jason and the kids behind to go have an experience without them, especially one of this time length (it’s a two hour drive there, so at least four hours of driving alone, plus I easily could spend hours here). On the other hand, I am now dealing with the guilt of having exposed my children to bugs, as I can see that there are easily a handful of mosquito bites on my baby, despite us covering him with baby-safe bug lotion, and I know my middle son got quite a few bites as well.

On the other hand, my kids did get exposed to a really cool experience. It is possible that my middle son does not appreciate it now, and I am not sure of the youngest really absorbed it either, but it was sublimely enriching to be standing there on the observation deck listening to all those shorebirds amassing on the island at the Rookery. The sound was intense: hundreds if not over a thousand cormorants, snowy and great egrets, spoonbills, and a few herons all talking in their various tones to each other and to their young. There were moments of peace in nature: walking across a bridge in a shady section of forest, watching warblers above us, marveling at mushrooms, looking through the ponds to see if we could see alligators.

Sometimes the experiences we were having led to conflicting emotions. At Purkey’s Pond in the Boy Scout Woods, watching the various birds who were coming to gather at the water, I had sat next to an older lady who was delighting at the sight of a Cedar Waxwing who was joining the Gray Catbirds and a lone Lincoln Sparrow. I had directed my middle son to sit on the bench lower down and to the right, because he didn’t have binoculars and wasn’t looking at birds, and I didn’t want him to disturb that lady. He kept coming back up to me, though, and asking “but why can’t I sit there?”, gesturing next to the lady, despite my having already explained this to him. This is typical behavior from him and is so frustrating, because it ended up being more disturbing to the lady that actually allowing him to sit next to her. This is an example of his social issues we still haven’t worked out that lead to much frustration on everyone’s part.

I want to BE that lady when I am older, but I am not sure I am going to make it that long. I have had this feeling for some years that I am going to get sick and pass away before my children are grown, and I can’t tell if that is just some crazy pessimism, fear, paranoia or a premonition. It drives me, though, to still commit to having the experiences I want to have, and having them now instead of waiting. I would rather die saying to myself “well, at least we did get to High Island” instead of wishing we had gotten there, even if it ended up not being everything I wanted it to be. I wanted to see a hundred types of birds and I only saw about twenty, but you know, if you look at e-bird reports from other birders there, the species lists range from 2-63, with most reports being between 15-25, so I think I did all right.

In the end, maybe it was just enough, because as we drove away, heading through Anahuac Wildlife Refuge and stopping at Smith Point, my overwhelming feeling was happiness. We climbed to the top of the observation tower at this spot that is famous for being a good place to watch raptors in the fall, and I felt such peace up there, watching the wind blow and the waves slowly make it to shore, and I feel like this will be an image I carry with me, like my husband says he has carried with him for years since hiding and maintaining a geocache out here. I will never forget the way the shorebirds called to each other at the Rookery, and how exciting it felt to see some of those more exotic birds that I did find, like the Baltimore Oriole and Summer Tanager. We had a great time exploring, even finding a fun new restaurant on the way home, and overall, it was a very positive experience that I hope we can draw from and experience again another year.

Attwater Prairie Chicken National Wildlife Refuge

The sun is rising over the Katy prairie, and a slightly chilly breeze greets the couple of dozen nature enthusiasts huddled in a group at the front of the parking lot for the visitor’s center. The group is waiting for vans to come pick them up, vans that are driven by wildlife biologists who know where to take the groups to have the best chance of seeing the Attwater’s prairie chickens.

This time of the year is exciting because it is when the prairie chickens are engaging in their ritual courtship behaviors. From February to May, the males try to attract a mate by “booming”, which is a process in which they inflate their air sacs and then deflate them (making the sound) while doing a little dance, sometimes charging at other males. This courtship peaks in April, which is why the NWR hosts their “BoomingNBloomin” Festival annually around this time.

We were in attendance this year, getting up early on a Saturday morning to get out there within the one-to-two hour time period that the birds are the most active. At the booming grounds, a viewing platform is temporarily placed to allow the groups to get up higher to see. Many birders have brought their long lens to shoot the birds with, while the biologists and other “guides” have set up scopes for people to get a better view. There are two trucks with antennas on top that are picking up signals from the radio collars that the female birds are wearing. This helps biologists track their breeding habits to help guide decisions on how to best help these birds.

Jason tried his hand at “digiscoping” in this picture below. Digiscoping means to combine a scope with a digital camera/phone camera to enhance the digital image. It takes a little bit of practice to make it work best.

We did get to see about a dozen of these endangered birds in the group that could be observed from the viewing platform, and then one lone chicken later, perched on a McCartney Rosebush, that was being quite the ham as we rode back in the van to the visitor center. He seemed to be showing off for our group. It was quite exciting to see so many birds considering that there are only about 90 or so of the birds left in the wild. It is one of the most endangered bird species in North America.

Just around a hundred years ago, the Attwater’s prairie chicken census was around a million birds in a habitat that ranged from Louisiana to all of coastal Texas. Their habitat shrank significantly due to land use changes, such as development and urban sprawl, conversion of fields to rice and bermuda grass productions instead of grassland, overgrazing by cattle, and invasion of non-native species of plants. From what I read on a poster at the festival, the population then further declined as a result of the movement of fire ants into their habitat. Fire ants eat insects that the prairie chicken’s chicks need for subsistence.

During our van tour, we saw several wire enclosures with dark netting across the top. These were acclimation pens to house captive-bred prairie chickens in before releasing them into the wild. Several zoos are participating in conservation efforts through breeding programs to help bring these birds back, including the Houston Zoo. We actually had one of the keepers in the van with us, who wanted to come out and see the end outcome. The biologists have done some experimenting to find out the ideal amount of time to house the captive bred birds in these acclimation pens to let them get used to the prairie before releasing them, and the time period that results in the lowest mortality turns out to be fourteen days. At the refuge, they also help the birds out by growing a rotation of crops that are helpful to the birds and allowing limited cattle grazing to help the land. They also do controlled burns to get rid of invasive plants.

As part of the annual festival’s activities, we also participated in a bird walk after viewing these birds. We had seen some huge white tailed hawks and little Northern Bobwhites from the van as we drove back, and during the walk we also saw Lincoln’s Sparrows, Barn Swallows, Purple Martins, and Upland Sandpipers (in addition to common birds that I don’t even record, like cardinals and mockingbirds). One interesting fact that the biologist who conducted our walk pointed out is that the Upland Sandpiper is also an endangered bird. He pointed out that more people go to a Texans football game than there are Upland Sandpipers left in the wild. Most of the population was wiped out by hunters after the passenger pigeons were disappearing, and the species has never been able to recover.We also saw some Black Necked Stilts and Scissor Tailed Flycatchers on the drive back. This brings our species count for the year up to 92.

The walk was not all that “birdy”, but it was really nice to be outside walking about the prairie. Many flowers were in bloom (which probably explains the “Bloomin” part of the festival name) and one of the men in our group kept pointing out the names of them as we went. It was interesting but my mind did not keep track of the information enough to recall it now.

The middle of our walk brought us to a horseshoe lake, and it was very peaceful out there. The breeze was gentle and it was quiet. I sat for a bit inside the bird blind, watching coots and grebes out on the water. For a short time, I visited with my friend Allison that I know from geocaching, who was also at the festival and participating in the same timeline of activities as we were. I got her phone number in hopes that we can plan an activity together, now that I know she also enjoys things like this.

Sebastian mostly slept in the stroller during this part, although he had been active earlier in the trip (practicing walking up and down the observation platform incline, and mooing at the cows in the nearby fields with me). He woke up when the walk ended, as we reached the open bay of a maintenance building where the Friends of Attwater Prairie Chickens group had information displays and fund raising sales set up, as well as free refreshments. We enjoyed talking to some older men that were a part of the group, after asking them about how to get to the Texas-Monthly famous Austin’s BBQ joint in Eagle Lake.

We stopped there on the way home and got enough BBQ for lunch and to have for dinner, and also found a geocache on the way home. It was a very enjoyable morning out at the preserve, located about a 45 minute drive west of Katy.

Normally, the van tours to see the prairie chickens run once a month, and people can do a car tour route to look themselves. The best time to view the chickens is around sunrise or in the hour after, like we did on our trip out there. I would recommend planning to stay for a half-day and taking a walk out there as well, or planning trip around the festival, which is usually the second weekend in April.

Here is more information on the National Wildlife Refuge:

http://www.fws.gov/refuge/Attwater_Prairie_Chicken/about.html

Texas Geocaching Challenge: Brenham

20160311_135322 — Neat Structure in Firemans Park

They say all you need to geocache is a sense of adventure and a GPS. These days, with the advent of the smartphone, you really don’t even need that GPSr. I think that sometimes we geocachers get so caught up in the game, in the numbers, in the bragging rights and competition, that we forget what got us into geocaching in the first place: that sense of adventure, a desire to explore our surroundings, to find something we never noticed before.

This sense of adventure is probably one of my defining character traits, and I brought it with me to the Annual Texas Challenge (and Geocaching Festival), which was held the first weekend of spring break in Brenham this year. I had taken the Friday off work to spend Thursday night through Saturday night in Brenham to participate in as many of the events as I was willing to sacrifice other time for (I had left my family behind for the first night).
Part of the reason I wanted to go up on Thursday night was to experience the Antique carousel at Fireman’s Park. It is such a cool story to think about how a group of citizens just found the horses abandoned in a field in 1932. Now that is a real cache! They managed to get the city to purchase the horses from the landowner and refurbish them for the delight of generations of people in Washington County. After some research, it was determined that the horses on the carousel were made sometime in the late 1800s. The carousel has been through some owner changes and refurbishments since, but the city continues to keep it going for all to enjoy.
Despite the fact that we couldn’t actually RIDE the carousel horses (for kids only), it was still pretty awesome to sit in the bench seat or stand next to the horses and ride this ancient carousel. We had an ice cream social that night, complete with a barbershop quartet, which most people were too busy talking to listen to. However, the best part of the evening for me was when the whole event was over and all had left the pavilion except a handful of us core folks, and yet the barbershop quartet was still there singing, just for fun, practice, or for each other. They were singing a beautiful rendition of “Bridge Over Troubled Water” that I was particularly enjoying when it was time for me to go, but memory of them singing that song is a little bit of a treasure.

The next day I had no particular plan except to show up, so in the morning I found a few places and had a coffee from the little coffee bar in the Pomegranate store/Funky Art Cafe that literally made me happy, and that I will look for in all the other coffee shops I go to in the future. I went to Fireman’s Park and watched Gary and his group assemble “cows” made out of plywood cutouts for a “milking” contest at the park before going for a ride with a couple I had met a few years back (Sue and Ron) to find a few caches with “Nashville Joe”, a guy who is a full-time RV-er, a lifestyle which I found fascinating. The caches we found were not that interesting in themselves, but they were near these juxtapositions of civilization and nature that kind of reminded me of what geocaching is kind of like, the mix of modern technology with bliss in nature.
We got back to Fireman’s Park in time for me to find another couple to hang out with, Kenny and Kelly, but as we were preparing to go to lunch, we also needed to find Donna and Lola, who had the coins I needed for registration. We all ended up going to lunch together at a place called Must Be Heaven, at which I had a delicious muffuletta sandwich. This restaurant is like an old fashioned soda fountain but has lots of healthy options for those on diets. I enjoyed it, but I am not the only one, because it has 4.5 stars out of 235 reviews on tripadvisor and is rated #1 out of 63 restaurants in Brenham. We also later had a dinner at Yumm! Eats and Sweets and Andrea’s Taco Shop, and a lunch at Smitty’s Cafe. All in all, I found myself pleased with all our culinary choices in this town, and I would say exploring new restaurants is one of my favorite hobbies.
Afterwards, I rode along with Donna and Lola to work on some lab caches. Lab caches are special finds set up for certain events, and are only available during a specific time frame. You don’t log them on the regular website, and they won’t show up on your list of finds, but they will count as a number for your find count. Instead of finding a container, you find a specific thing in a location, details of which are giving on the external website link, and you log each one by typing a code word into the website for each one. I worked on the lab caches with these two girls and then later with Jason and Sebastian, and here are some pictures of what you might find at the location. Through the lab caches, we had the following experiences over the weekend: discovering a sweet shop called Bliss that sells gourmet cupcakes and truffles, walking through Washington on the Brazos State Park down to the Brazos River and observing how high it was at this time, buying ice cream cones at a classic old grocery store/bbq shop at the corner of a dirt road, pushing the stroller through Main Street in Chappell Hill and checking out the shops, being the only visitors at a quiet old museum and a park in Independence and letting Sebastian run around and explore.
These were some of the best times of the weekend. Memories of these experiences are the real treasures we find while geocaching.
We also worked on finishing our Birthplace of Texas GeoTour, and by Saturday midday, we had completed enough to claim our geocoin that you earn for obtaining 25 points on your passport. Points can be earned by finding the geocaches as well as eating, shopping and lodging in Washington County (but you have to turn in your receipts to prove purchases). Jason had wanted to help the scoring team get set up with another computer and do some other misc things, so I put Sebastian in the stroller and walked from the Chamber of Commerce to the Visitors Center down in the old-fashioned downtown area to turn in our passports and pick up our coin.

20160311_112512 — One of the ammo can trophies won in the Texas Challenge on display at the Visitors Center

After we picked up our coin, we had fun exploring all the little antique shops and art galleries. One of my favorite finds during the hour or two my baby and I strolled down there was this stand of cool little stuffed animals made out of alpaca fur. They were so soft and neat looking and I contemplated buying one for Sebastian, but in the end decided they were a little too pricey (but so adorable).

Over the weekend, Sebastian explored natural areas and items, discovering things like the magic of dandelions and the boldness of older kids. He helped us find actual geocaches, sift through antiques, and learned about cisterns at a little historical area that we found walking about downtown. He had fun all the places we went, and so did we. For this reason, now Brenham will be dear to my heart, the same way Bastrop became after the Challenge that was hosted there in 2014. We have been back to Bastrop quite a bit since, spending weekends and money there having further adventures, and I feel like we might do the same in Brenham in the future.

For this reason, I think that a geocaching event is more than just claiming a smiley, getting the icon on your profile. It is more than the people you meet, and the other caches you find in the area. Just like geocaching is mostly more about the journey than the actual destination/find, this weekend was more about the exploration than finding hidden containers. In a way, the whole town was our “cache” – a treasure trove, a place where valuables (like the neat little alpaca toys, great coffee, all the fun places we discovered together) are stored.

I didn’t compete in the actual Challenge this year, but I had more fun than I usually do, less pressure, and more time to just explore. There has been talk (usually from my husband) that maybe we should do away with the competition aspect of the Challenge, as it just brings out the worst in people. Maybe after this year, they might, but I think in the future, I am going to approach big events like this with the same attitude of exploration, and find all the neat little gems about the town along the way.

Here are some other scenes from downtown Brenham: