March Birds

By Jim Stevenson
IMPORTANT!!! Once again, we need someone to sit at our GOS table at FeatherFest. I will take evenings, Thursday, Sunday and all lunches. We need 4-hour blocks Friday and Saturday, mornings and afternoons, while I run field trips. Please help if you can!

If ANYONE hasn’t received books, calendars or whatever you may have ordered, please let me know asap. IF ANYONE WANTS A BOOK, just send $43 to the GOS, Rt. 1 Box 185C, Galveston, TX, 77554. Let me know what, if anything, you want me to write.

There’s an excellent article in the NY Times above you may appreciate, on the problems with outdoor cats.

Once again the spring GOS schedule is attached below:

Spring is by far our best birding season and we have a plethora of wonderful activities to choose from. We bird using the GOS van and visit various sites on the Upper Texas Coast. Trips are inexpensive and usually see over a hundred species. E-mail Jim at [email protected] for reservations, or call (409) 370-1515.

March 29- Brazoria County- Visit Brazoria and San Bernard NWR, Quintana Neotropical Sanctuary and other great birding spots. Meet in Galveston at 8 am and return at 5 pm. $40

April 5- East Loop: Visit Bolivar Flats, High Island and Anahuac NWR, see shorebirds, waders and early songbird migrants. Meet at 59th Street Post Office at 7:30 am or Ferry Landing at 8 am (so you can leave your car and avoid the line). Great birding! $40

April 12- FeatherFest! Everybody attend! www.galvestonfeatherfest.com

April 18-20- GOS Trip to Grand Isle in Louisiana: Sabine Woods, Peveto Woods, NWRs with waterfowl, and Grand Isle for trans-Gulf songbird migrants. $400 pays for hotels and transportation. Possible side trip to Atchafalaya Basin.

April 24-27- Spring Songbird Seminar: Four days of birding the Upper Texas Coast in a small group in the heart of the songbird and shorebird migration. We visit all the great places in the GOS van and see well over 200 species. Best birding of the year! $400

May 1-4- GOS Field Photo Workshop: Four days of shooting songbirds and shorebirds migrants in the best sites on the UTC. Get over 100 species of sandpipers, warblers, marsh and swamp birds and much more. You’ll get fantastic photos of great birds! $500

May 27-June 8- Plains-Rockies Trip: Begin in North Dakota and bird our way southwest eleven days through Montana, Idaho, Yellowstone in Wyoming and into Utah, birding the Great Salt Lake last. See gobs of new species with neat people. $2000

June 8-15- A second leg visits the Great Salt Lake and then heads to California for West Coast and Sierra birds. More new birds and beautiful scenery! $1500.

July 16-31- Australia Trip: Work the fantastic NE side of Australia from Townsville up to Cairns, the Cape York Peninsula and across the fabulous Outback to Darwin, including Kakadu National Park. See hundreds of wildly-colored, unfamiliar birds, kangaroos, and all the exciting zoology of Australia. Pleasant winter temperatures in July. $4000

 

One of our most faithful March migrants is the American Golden-Plover, a long-distant migrant if there ever was one. They winter on the Pampas of southern South America and fly in spring all the way to the Arctic to breed – right through the Western Gulf Coast States. In fall they are seen further east, with most flying down the Atlantic.

 

American Golden-Plovers do an odd thing in the bird world. They pass through here in spring in basic (winter) plumage and then stop in the northern US and molt into their alternate (breeding) plumage, before continuing on to Alaska. They then molt their fine breeding garb after raising the chicks, so if they’re seen in Florida in fall, they once again look like the above bird. I will be happy to show you the breeding plumage – go on the Alaska trip!

 

Here’s one on the side of the North Slope Haul Road, halfway between the Arctic Circle and the Arctic Ocean. We see Black-bellied Plovers black underneath here in Texas but not usually Goldens. I have seen one close to this nice over in Brazoria County several years ago, but it’s rare, and later than they usually pass through.

 

Black-and-White Warblers are quite common in March and this female (white throat) is foraging the branch right out my window. They have long, strong toes and long claws for holding on while they contort, and their cryptic coloration is amazing. This bird may be seen throughout the entire migrant, unusual for a species.

 

Gnatcatchers are a group of Old World Warblers with only this Blue-gray being seen over much of the US. They have a thin bill for catching tiny insects and a long, cocked tail for balance. They nest over much of the East and have hummingbird-like small nests with lichen, 8-12 feet up in a tree. Notice the Stinging Nettle on the right. You better!

 

Cowbirds and Common Grackles come rolling in very early spring and do songbirds a great deal of damage. The former lays their eggs in other birds’ nests, cutting their reproductive success drastically. The latter just eats eggs and young of smaller birds, being far worse than their larger cousins, the BT and GT. Ever since I lost a Painted Bunting nest to intruders, I have taken a hard line against them.

 

Brown Thrashers winter on the UTC but historically have left before the breeding season. However, I was told they recently bred in Laffite’s Cove, and then a pair of Long-billed Thrashers did the same thing! (See what I miss by being in Alaska!) Thrashers’ streaks tell them from thrush’s spots, plus they are longer and more slender.

 

This fine male Black-throated Green Warbler showed up in my yard March 19, quite an early record. The majority of “firsts” we get are males, as they migrate first to drink and party with their buddies before their wives arr ive. Oh, and they also stake out the nest site and territory, plus get their song down pat.

 

Blue-winged Teal are common spring arr ivals from the Tropics as circum-Gulf migrants, following the shoreline with other ducks, many waders and three species of sandpipers. Their long, saber-like wings allow them to fly like the wind, probably frustrating more than a few duck hunters.

 

Odd birds show up in March and early April like this female Canvasback. She may nest as far north as Alaska, easily picked out by the long, sloping profile of the beak and forehead. Many birders have the mistaken impression that diving ducks are marine, but they nest in freshwater, they mostly migrate over freshwater and some winter there, with Ring-necked Ducks only being seen there. But dabbling ducks are certainly more freshwater than diving ducks.

 

Double-crested Cormorants winter in many places along the Gulf Coast, as well as inland, but most head north in March. This immature has a freshwater catfish, which it will carefully swallow headfirst, and some its age won’t head north to breed. Notice the large, yellow gular pouch that’s vertical at the lower back. It’s slanted in the Neotrop.

 

I got this adult to turn his head to better show you the gular pouch. The orange-black border goes straight down. Also, cormorants have green eyes - better for seeing f ish underwater. As you can see, adult cormorants are quite black, but the Neotropic often has a white face, which makes them unmistakable.

 

Female Eastern Meadowlarks are easily mistaken for Westerns in winter due to their pale plumage. However, check out the buffy flanks (white in Westerns) and the absence of yellow on the malar. (The old Sibley doesn’t treat this well.) Easterns also have more contrast with the stripes over the crown than Westerns. If you think you have a Western, listen for the “chuck” call note they often make.

 

Eastern Phoebes are our only wintering flycatcher and are fairly common throughout March, when other species are moving in. Their tail-bobbing is diagnostic and the large, dark, oversized head works, too. The thorny tree is a Hercules Club, one of those I planted for their attractiveness to birds. But nothing beats my plum!

 

Like meadowlarks, Horned Larks (different family) are very common in winter along dunes, but most go north this time of year. A scant few stick around and breed, such as (I believe) near the bollards at Bolivar Flats (or the two ends of Galveston Island). This bird has grabbed an arthropod, and I am want to ID it. Vernon? Hap?

 

A fine bird of M arch (and seldom other times) is the Louisiana Waterthrush. You may tell them from the Northern by their large bill, whiter eyestripe behind the eye, beige flanks and pinkish legs. These nest in the Deep South so they pass through early, and in fall (read, “summer”) they may beat the birders to Laffites!

 

Northern Parula breed over much of the heavily forested areas and swamps of the East, being especially common in the Deep South. The blue back and yellow throat are fair ly diagnostic in the warbler world, although the females are a bit duller. One local place they are seen and heard all summer is Brazos Bend State Park (and Prothonotaries).

 

Orange-crowned Warblers are around all winter but they pile up on the UTC in March. They are a dull warbler – perhaps their best field mark? – and are tame and feed low. This one has been feeding on thistles in the yard, and “this’ll” attract parulas as well. Their conical bills help them feed in winter, sorta like the large beaks of Yellow-rumped and Pine Warblers. Also note the green rump patch.

Ruby-crowned Kinglets followed the warblers down to ground level & joined in probing the thistles for small insects. They have tiny bills and uneven white eyerings, plus they are nervous and fuss almost constantly. (Not as attractive when human.) These flowers are also very important to hummers, as a very early source of sugar.

 

Our only eastern hummer is the Rudy-throated, although various rare western species do visit or winter. RTs ease in by mid-March and are fairly common through April. These males (with the ruby throat) are hard to find much after FF. The role they and insects play in nature cannot be overstated, really representing perhaps the most important symbiotic relationship on the Planet.

 

Our Sandhill Cranes left in March, as they always do, but this was the first year that they stayed until my 3/17 birthday! How exciting! Their “chick” on the right is as big as its parents and has lost all the brown tinge from the winter. They do not feed like herons and egrets, but rather work the fields and pastures for small vertebrates, tubers, bugs, etc.

 

Had to Photoshop the limbs away but you’re left with an adult White-crowned Sparrow at the entrance of Brazoria NWR. This species and Song Sparrows are both found at this location but not often anywhere else on the UTC. (Go figger???) The smart pink bill and head stripes are pretty obvious, and their tink calls are diagnostic.

 

Immature white-crowns are browner up front but are still handsome, large sparrows. My buddy Vernon in Oklahoma sees a bazillion of them up there, and they are widespread throughout much of the West. I even see them north of the Brook’s Range, on the edge of the timberline, 80 miles from the Arctic Ocean! I wish all our birds were doing that well.

 

White-eyed Vireos are very common in March and breed in the drier areas on Mainland UTC. Their syncopated songs reverberate through the scrub, but it can be difficult to spot the singing males. I am always reminded of my dear friend from childhood, Jack Dozier, when he was just learning birds, called them “Wide-eyed Vireos.”

 

Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers are quiet, winter residents in places such as Laffite’s Cove; and this bird spent part of March in my yard as a returning migrant from further south. (Class, today we’re gonna study run-on sentences…) The white, vertical wing-bar is a great field mark for sapsuckers flying or sitting, You can also see they’re woodpeckers by the stiff tail and chisel beak. March is a neat time, but mostly it comes right before April!!!

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