Birds of a Feather Fly to South Texas!

Every morning I watch them!

Photo by Candi Foltz on Unsplash

I saw a funny meme that said, “One day you are doing crazy things in college and the next day you are buying birdseed on Amazon.”

It made me laugh, because it’s true! If we think back carefully, we can account for past years, but when I was in college, working, and raising children, I did not find time to watch birds.

Growing up in the Midwest, I learned to imitate a Northern Cardinal's call, and I liked the St. Louis baseball Cardinals. I loved the movie, The Birds, by Alfred Hitchcock.

I have lived in South Texas for over forty years. It is a major birding center. People travel long distances to spot rare birds.

Last February, my cousins came from Canada to view birds in South Texas, where I live. They saw six birds they had never seen in my backyard on their first day here.

Green Jays, Northern Cardinal, and Great Kiskadee

I took them to different birdwatching sites, and I was amazed how many people are serious birdwatchers. At a state park near my home, many people were gathered around a tree. They were excitedly whispering and pointing at a rare bird.

I have forgotten exactly which rare bird they were watching.

That’s proof that I am not a major birdwatcher.

We drove with my cousins two hours north to the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge area to see Whooping Cranes. There are around 500 Whooping Cranes in the world, and we saw six of them! They are the tallest cranes in North America. They migrate from Canada to Texas.

Of course, they don’t always hang out in wildlife refuges. We saw them in a field on the side of a road.

Whooping Crane photo by author

In my backyard, we have Green Jays, White-wing and Mourning Doves, Grackles, sparrows, Great Kiskadees, Orioles, and hummingbirds.

I keep a hummingbird feeder right outside the window so I can watch while I write or drink coffee.

Oriole in my backyard, photo by author

We have other visitors, too. We have Black-bellied Whistling Ducks and Muscovy Ducks.

Sometimes we have White Ibises.

Occasionally, a Great Blue Heron will stop by the resaca at the end of our property. A resaca is a narrow lake that looks like a river. Resacas are common near the Rio Grande River. They are dried-up channels of the river.

Great Egret Photo by author

Egret in resaca by my home. Photo by author

I love to take my granddaughter walking in the neighborhood. We identify the birds with a pamphlet I got at the grocery store.

Birds of South Texas

Cormorants and Roseate Spoonbills hunt for fish about a mile up the road where the resaca ends. Nature takes over where the houses end.

A month ago, a Roseate Spoonbill escaped from the local zoo. My granddaughter was very worried about it, called her Rosie, and asked about her daily.

Roseate Spoonbill at the local zoo. Photo by author

I recall my great aunt loving to watch birds when I was the age my granddaughter is now. I helped my aunt when she tried to outsmart the squirrels with coffee cans and other devices to keep them from stealing bird seed. It never worked.

That was in another city and another time, but it is comforting to know I am passing this interest in birds to my granddaughter. My granddaughter and I laugh as the squirrels do acrobatic feats to steal birdseed.

It is estimated that the North American bird population has declined by three billion birds since 1970.

There is a free app called Merlin that identifies birds by sound. It is part of Cornell University, and it is amazing.

Even though the world has fewer birds, we have more technology to identify them.

My goal is to see a painted bunting in the wild. They are so colorful.

I had an interesting experience at the house I lived in twenty years ago. There was a dead palm tree in front of the house, and I asked the city to cut it down because it seemed to be a hazard in a storm.

The man who came out looked at it and told me,

“I can’t cut it down. Endangered parrots are nesting in the hole up there.” Sure enough, there were parrots!

The house was near a fairly busy road, but the palm tree became a tourist attraction.

A family of parrots entertained people, and cars would slow down to observe the parrots.

Parrots in South Texas Screenshot by author

Parrots do not come to my backyard now, but they are loud squawking birds, and I hear them fly by sometimes in front of the house.

Thanks to Lu Skerdoo for her story about birds that inspired me to write this one.

I will leave you with four pictures. Identify the ones that contain birds. It will not determine if you are a human reading this, but I hope you enjoy!

Great Blue Heron Photo by author

Muscovy Duck, Mockingbird in flight and armadillo family. Photos by author