Santa Ana NWR and Estero Llano Grande SP

Wonderful day....

I got up at 6:30, had the complimentary motel breakfast (scrambled eggs and coffee) and drove to Santa Ana, about 15 miles. It opened at 8:00 and soon thereafter, a volunteer came out to fill the feeders at the Visitor Center. While waiting for the bird walk to start, I saw Green Jays, a Common Ground Dove, Kiskadees, a Black-crested Nuthatch, Golden-fronted Woodpeckers and Altamira Orioles! These were new birds for me, all mixed in with a couple hundred noisy Red-winged Blackbirds. The walk started at 8:30 and a dozen of us participated.

In all these refuges, there are many volunteers. (Maria had told me about this, as she had talked with one of them on their trip down the East Coast.) Most are seniors and many are couples. One such couple led the walk. The husband carried a spotting scope which he would set up whenever and wherever anyone wanted to get better looks at something. He admitted he did not know birds that well, but said there are all levels of birders on these walks and everyone contributes. His wife was the ostensible birding expert but she really wasn't, although it didn't matter at all. He was efficient and definitely a leader type without being obnoxious. We ambled slowly along for 90 minutes, stopping often to watch whatever was there: stilts, ducks, sandpipers, shrikes, a Merlin, Ladder-backed Woodpeckers (life bird), coots, Belted Kingfisher, a White-faced Ibis....I had prepared with sunblock and mosquito spray but the wind was strong which helped, at least with the mosquitoes. We were warned to stay on the trails because of unfriendly flora (thorns) and fauna (snakes and alligators). The understory was a tropical tangle of trees, brush, shrubs, vines, grasses, wet and swampy areas and small lakes scattered throughout the refuge. It would be challenging to try to navigate through this and often we walked along trails that were very slightly elevated.

There was an elderly couple in the group who were knowledgeable about birding and had been at Santa Ana "oh...a hundred times." They live near Austin. Somehow in the random chatting, I learned that he was Dutch and his name was John Vanderheide. They knew of Holland and said there were people living there with the same last name but not relatives. They had been to the Netherlands many times. John had been born there, and his father actually returned in his later years and died there. John had been a mining engineer in the UP and and said how much he loved living in Marquette...loved the winters. He would have Snowy Owls perched on his roof. There were also two middle-aged couples from Vermont. One of these women did not suffer from a lack of confidence in her ID skills. Back at the Visitor Center before we started, she pointed out a Cassin's Sparrow lurking in the underbrush. I got a good look at it and took her word for it. What do I know about Cassin's Sparrows? Absolutely nothing. It was a totally plain bird with no noticeable wing bars or streaks or other markings. It didn't look much like the Cassin's in the field guide. Later I was playing the song of the Cassin's on my iPhone, and she heard it and casually said, "Oh no, that wasn't a Cassin's; it was an Olive Sparrow...we had been learning songs on the plane and thought it was the Cassin's..." So that was another LB for me: Olive Sparrow, which is only found in the US in the extreme tip of Texas. We heard it several times after that, but it is a skulker and difficult to see.

The coolest thing happened when we came to the an area of three obsevation towers, two of which were connected by a rope bridge. The scope guy told us that there was supposed to be an Eastern Screech Owl in a dead tree in a hole at "eye level" at the top of the tower. If anyone wanted to try it, he said, go for it. John and I immediately headed up and a few others followed. He was a bit unsteady on his feet and wore hearing aides but was also tough and never hesitated. We moved slowly up a metal spiral staircase and at the top, John started calling the owl. He warbled and hooted several times. Obviously he knew what he was doing. But no owl appeared so three of us began walking across to the other tower. John went back down and of course, the owl showed! Those who stayed at the first tower motioned us back, and there it was checking out the situation. We could only see it from the eyes up but were very close. It was one more thrilling moment for all of us.

Most of the group returned to the Center but the leaders, John and his wife and I took another short trail that had three observation decks overlooking Willow Lake, and I saw several Least Grebes (LB). These look like small Pied-billed Grebes with sharper, thinner bills. I think I had 10 life birds at Santa Ana.

I hadn't intended to go there, but the Vermont lady said Estero Llano was a must-see park and "you can sit on a deck and eat ice-cream while you watch the birds." As I didn't have specific plans or a detailed itinerary (I do have the big picture in my head), I decided to backtrack a bit and go there. What has been frustrating the past few days is how little signage there is for these places. I use my iPhone constantly for directions and am constantly on Farm to Market roads, many of which curve all over.

At Estero, as I was getting out of my car, four Plain Chachalacas ran into the brush right in front of me (another new bird) and, while walking to the Visitor Center to pay, there were hummingbird feeders, one with a Black-chinned. Score again! The ranger said I could put it on the white board which was on the ice-cream-eating deck and which aleady had a list of the 50+ birds seen on Sunday. Black-chins are less common than Buff-bellied Hummingbirds, the very common hummer here, and which I saw later. The Buffs have a long red bill that highlights in the sun. Really, how cool is that? I am laughing as I type this because if one has no interest in birds (well you probably aren't even reading this), a glowing red hummingbird bill would never even be seen. It's weird about people's passions...I can barely imagine NOT being seduced, thrilled, enchanted, engaged and soothed by birds. But it also is about so much more than the birds themselves, as is illustrated by what happened tomorrow. Although, this was still very much in the context of birdwatching.

The ranger told me about a couple of trails where I might see a Green Kingfisher. I am getting increasingly directionally challenged and went off TWICE on wrong trails, but finally got oriented and, while it wasn't far, it WAS off in the boonies...to Grebe Pond and Alligator Lake. No kingfisher but a huge alligator on the far side of the lake and several roosting Night-herons (both species). I chatted with a young guy from Manitoba who was also searching for the Green Kingfisher and got close looks at a Red-shouldered Hawk sitting on the steep bank of a canal.

The vocabulary of all of this activity is totally about what and where people are finding and have found this or that bird, usually low-key and often informative. If someone sees something, people quietly and quickly move into position, set up scopes and camers and binoculars and peer, giving specific directions for those who have trouble locating the bird: "See that dead tree? the one in front of the little grassy area? Go up the larger trunk...see where it splits? go to the right on that branch at about 2 o'clock, next to that dark spot....."

I bought an ice-cream bar and sat in the shade in the hummingbird garden with four older gentleman who were talking optics. Orange-crowned Warblers also were intermittently sipping the sugar water.

I got in the car and watched doves in the parking lot, before heading into town. I decided to try the Valley Nature Center and was glad I did. This is a sweet little pocket park right in the middle of town, behind a park where kids were playing basketball. I paid a small fee and went out the back into a small but charming place with trails, feeding stations and water drips, a cactus garden, a native plant nursery, a tropical area and occasional benches, all with the noise of the city in the background but somehow still peaceful and secluded. I thought I saw a Clay-colored Robin but won't count it as I didn't get a good look. I saw and watched the hummingbird feeders (only Buff-bellied) and revived in the cool shade. (The trails I was on at Estero were in the hot sun.)

Inside the nature center were educational exhibits and the usual large snakes in glass cages. Nice for the neighborhood which was Hispanic...as is 95% of south Texas except for the tourists.

To another La Quinta. The working conditions (computer desks and chairs and usually a stable high-speed connection) in the slightly higher priced motels is worth the extra money. I ate at a local Mexican restaurant and had a fountain drink which I thought was lemonade but was a delicious milky coconut drink. More diced beef tacos with onions and cilantro and hot sauces on the side. The tacos were like the ones we used to eat as kids except the meat wasn't ground.

These more local places have staff with limited English language abilities, and I have no Spanish ability but we managed. Immersion like this would certainly make learning a second language easier.