A Shrike Strikes - Monday, May 18, 2015

One of my favorite things to do if I'm writing a blog during the day is to watch birds visiting our bird feeders. The usual suspects that crack into the safflower seeds are sparrows, house finches, cardinals, the occasional red-winged blackbirds, and the birds who pick up the seeds off the grass - Inca doves, white-winged doves and a couple of pigeons. I also have hummingbirds at the hummingbird feeder.

Imagine my surprise when I looked out and saw this bird sitting on the feeding pole...

Northern (or loggerhead?) shrike

This shrike kept looking at the ground.

I was snapping away, taking photos of the shrike, when I should have been looking at the ground. This became very apparent when the shrike flew to the ground. There, dead as could be, was a sparrow. As I watched, the shrike picked up the dead sparrow in its beak and flew away with it. (The only reason I think this is a Northern Shrike is because of the obvious hook at tip of its bill. But it could be a loggerhead shrike because of the wider face mask and its range into south Texas.)

I immediately grabbed my Sibley's Field Guide to Birds and looked up Northern and loggerhead shrikes. It says, "Perches on high exposed branch or wire when foraging for small birds and rodents." I didn't see how the sparrow died, but I surmised the shrike had something to do with it. Many sparrows have eaten at my feeder, but none have died. As soon as I see a shrike, I see a dead sparrow. Coincidence? I think not.

Anyway that was Mother Nature's lesson for today. I never would have believed the shrike could fly away with a sparrow, but I saw it with my own eyes. Wow.

I also have a couple of hummingbird photos to share:

Travel Bug out.

Bird Jackpot! - Sun., Dec.22

Today I saw a long-eared owl, vermilion flycatcher, mute swans, and an American wigeon. Quite a day at Mitchell Lake Audubon Wetlands in San Antonio. Bird-watchers have been a-twitter about the long-eared owl for over a week. Last week I couldn't find it, but today...jackpot!

Long-eared owl.

Long-eared owl in a mesquite tree.

Long-eared owl.

But that wasn't the only unusual bird seen today. We were walking along the isthmus between the East and West Polder. I looked across the pond and said, "Wow! Those are the biggest honkin' geese I've ever seen ** or ** those are swans!" When I got back to the Visitor Center, I asked if there were swans in the west pond and the answer was, "Yes." I wanted to know what kind and was informed they are mute swans.

Mute swans

Mute swans

I consider the swans quite a find in south Texas. Their range is the Midwest and Northeast, especially Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Tennessee, Kentucky, along the northeastern seaboard, eastern Minnesota, eastern Iowa and eastern Missouri.

Bob and I had a great walk today, although a cold wind was blowing down from the north. As we were walking, we saw a number of people wandering through the weeds and brush taking photos. We heard a bird making a very unusual noise and couldn't identify it.

I tried to find the unique birds on our way back to the Visitor Center, but no luck. However in the Visitor Center, a birder was talking about adding TWO birds to his birding life list today: the long-eared owl and a common pauraque (which is a type of nighthawk). We're thinking the bird with the unusual call was the pauraque.

In addition to the above birds, we saw:

American wigeon and Northern shoveler

Snowy egret & tri-colored heron with four turtles.

Wind-blown snowy egret and five sunning turtles.

Northern shrike.

 Below is one of my personal favorites: the vermilion flycatcher.

Vermilion flycatcher

Vermilion flycatcher

Black-necked stilt

Great blue heron taking off.

Northern shrike

Three turtles sunning

I was very happy with the bird sightings today! Maybe I'll go back tomorrow to look for more. We'll see what tomorrow brings.

After our walk, we went home and I showered to get ready for our employee Christmas party at the RV park tonight. We headed over to the Rec Hall at 6 p.m. and were greeted with our choice of beer, wine, pop, water or spiked eggnog. Bob and I shared a bottle of prickly pear beer. It was good. The hall looked so festive decorated for the holidays and our party.

Rec Hall decorated for employee dinner.

Helen (co-worker), Brenda (manager), and Pam (friend).

The dinner was catered by The Big Bib BBQ restaurant. It was delicious! We had smoked turkey, smoked brisket, pulled pork, jalapeno sausages and regular sausages with fantastic BBQ sauce to put on the meats. In addition, we had scalloped potatoes, green beans with cut up sausages, corn bread, sourdough bread with cheeses, squash casserole, veggie tray, and fruit tray. For dessert, we feasted on banana cream pie, chocolate cream pie, cheesecake and cupcakes.

Here are all the people who work in the park and their significant others.

Helen (office), Ron, Brenda (manager), Terry (manager),
Fran (activities director), Tom (landscape)

Dixie (cleaning), Felix (cleaning), Rose,
Mike (maintenance), DeAnna (Security) and Larry (Security)

Steve (landscape/maintenance), Jan (office), Lee (cleaning),
Delia (office), Virginia, Pam, Bob (maintenance)

Steve (landscape, Margaret, Vickie, Ralph (office),
me (office), Bob

We had a great evening with our RV park "family." And I'll tell you what, there was plenty of food. I'm still full five hours later.

After the party, we took care of seven loads of laundry. A very satisfying day from start to finish,

Travel Bug out.

Hot Half Marathon, Bob Suffers - Sun., Nov. 17

After our wonderful cool temperatures earlier in the week, today turned out to be quite warm...to the tune of 88 degrees and high humidity. This weather is not conducive to running marathons or half marathons.

One time when Bob ran a full marathon in Kona, Hawaii (very hot, no shade), he passed out at the side of the road and mobile medics rehydrated and cooled him. He could not finish that marathon.

I called Bob 4-1/2 hours after his approximate start time and there was no answer. He didn't call for quite a while. Because the full marathon passed very close by our RV park, I kept hearing ambulances. Even though the half marathon didn't pass by here, hearing the sirens made me wonder if Bob was okay. If you know me, you know I worry. 

He finally called while I was walking at the Mitchell Lake Audubon Wetlands. (He hadn't taken his phone with him.) Apparently toward the end of the race, Bob was really dragging. After crossing the finish line he had to go to the medical tent for very low blood pressure and dehydration. He was treated with IV fluids and ice packs to his head. They kept him for a while. He was told by medics that quite a few people needed medical care today because of the high temperature and high humidity. Scary stuff. Three years ago, someone died on this course. After relaxing all afternoon, he is fine now.

Around 12:30 p.m. I headed over to Mitchell Lake Audubon Wetlands for a 10K Volksmarch. When I started out, it was hot, but there was a little breeze blowing. However, by the time I walked down the hill and into the trees, no more breeze. It felt almost as hot as a summer day and it was miserable. Not to mention that  spiders must have hatched because I kept walking through single-strand webs. Ugh! I hate spiders.

Today, the ducks were out in force! It's the first time I've seen so many ducks in the polders.

Hundreds of ducks in East Polder.

Explanation of polders.

Northern shrike

American avocet and ducks

Northern shoveler

Blue-winged teal

Cinnamon teal

American avocets eating

Two turtles

Spider with butterfly (?)

Checkered white butterflies mating.

Checkered white butterflies

Checkered white butterflies

When I looked up the above butterflies online, the description said they can only be found in Raleigh, NC. I beg to differ because these two were at the Mitchell Lake Wetlands Audubon Center in San Antonio, TX!!

Turtles on the opposite shore.

Great egrets and American white pelicans.

Snowy egrets

Black-necked stilt and two American avocets

Just plain hot trail.

Weird-looking beetle

Northern shoveler - adult male

Northern shoveler - adult breeding female

Ducks and American avocets

Ducks with small shorebirds.

I was very happy to finish this walk and hop into my car and blast the air conditioner on my way home!

As promised here is a photo of my hair. It's very blonde and very short. She chopped off my sideburns which I wasn't happy about. (Are they called sideburns on a woman??)

Cheesy selfie, but you can see my hair.

Tonight Bob took me out for dessert at Olive Garden as a pre-birthday celebration. I had Black Tie Mousse Cake and he had Chocolate Mousse Seven-Layer Cake. Very decadent.

Tomorrow, I am going to see "12 Years A Slave" with Sharon from our RV park. She's as much a movie buff as I am, so we'll probably be seeing lots of movies together.

Enjoy your week before Thanksgiving. Safe travels everyone.