birds – Page 2 – The Hermits' Rest

Bays, bears, and bubbly

Today’s adventure in Myrtle Beach was to find the Lewis Ocean Bay Heritage Preserve. This is the huge protected area we learned about yesterday from the birder/salesman. It’s a beautiful pine forest maintained by prescribed burns. It’s home to a population of carnivorous plants (that we didn’t see, sadly) and many other interesting species that grow among the Carolina bays—shallow ovals that collect rainwater then dry up. They are dry now.

The bays are formed in incredibly white sand and look pretty weird out there in the forest.

Anita and I drove all over, looking for trees with Red-cockaded Woodpecker nests. We found nests, but no birds.

Luckily there were other birds, like Eastern Towhees, Indigo Buntings (even saw one!), Red-headed Woodpeckers, Brown Thrashers, and a beautiful Swallow-tailed Kite.

I found many interesting new plants, too. There were a few still blooming in the heat.

The most exciting sight was a young bear who trotted across the road a ways down the road from us. That was my first wild black bear sighting. This preserve has a thriving population. Amazing that it’s so near civilization it so remote.

I’d love to come back at a time of year with more moderate temperatures, because there are many miles of trails to explore.

We headed out and found a Publix supermarket, which was kind of like visiting a tourist attraction. We got fun food to eat the rest of the week. Most importantly, we got beverages.

After afternoon rest, we picked up my book about the Cherokee wars of 1776 written by Kevin the bartender/professor. I like his views of history from different viewpoints. Then I had to take Anita to the Sea Captain’s House for a taste of old Myrtle Beach. It’s a ritual!

The views were beautiful, the wine bubbly (Anita’s), and the food just lovely. We knew we needed to eat hummingbird cake for dessert!

The visit so far has been pleasant. The traffic and crowds aren’t bad at all. Hooray for NOT coming during Bike Week!

Reason to be celebrating America today

Today was Anita’s and my first full day on our genuine vacation with NO WORK involved. Throughout the day, I was reminded of why we still have a chance to recover and be proud of our 250-year-old country.

The day started out with a dreaded condominium sales pitch. Anita agreed to do it so I could get a bunch of Hilton Honors points. There’s no way Anita should be buying a timeshare, but we went through the motions with a sweet young salesman. I think he’d never heard a story like hers, but he tried real hard to do the pitch he was supposed to do, knowing he would not make a sale.

Wandering around looking at condos and getting sales pitches.

We got to the very end, when they bring in “the closer” to try one more time to get her to buy. While that didn’t work, somehow the topic of birds came up. He was a big-time birder! He turned into his human, non-salesperson self and we had a great talk. He told me about a fascinating sanctuary to go to, drew me a map and everything. Faith in Americans revived! We all have things in common!

An interesting group of new and old military planes and helicopters flew by the beach. That was fun.

We took a walk on the boardwalk here at Myrtle Beach and looked at the wide variety of humans who visit here. You name the ethnic group, there were some of them here. It’s not a snooty place like Hilton Head can be. Middle America was well represented, and everyone was cheerful, friendly, and having fun. That’s how it should be. No signs of divisiveness at all.

We took naps this afternoon, a real treat for both of us, then headed off to get food at the sports bar. Everyone we talked to was friendly and happy to be here. We had fun with a new young woman friend from Georgia and discussed more with Kevin the bartender/history professor about how our families interacted. He was related to my childhood pediatrician. Weird.

Unrelated: Anita spotted this Osprey with a large fish flying around our balcony.

But that’s the point. If you actually talk to people you will find commonality. That’s my favorite part of relaxed travel, getting to know new people. America doesn’t seem as full of hate and division when you interact with the people around you.

That brings me to Independence Day fun. We were going to try to get high up in the building to see fireworks, when they started and we realized we could see them from where we were. A young couple invited us to join them on a comfy bench, so we watched a huge display with them.

Our view of fireworks and other condo folks

The young people were having a nice break from their sleeping baby (who they were watching via a video call—clever), which means all four of us were relaxed and happy to enjoy the show with low stress. We had to do the oohing and aahing, because it’s mandatory. It was great to enjoy the festivities with them.

We went back to our room and were charmed by the impressive shows regular people were putting on up and down the beach. We did get our fill of pyrotechnics and were glad nothing burned.

All in all, I felt better today than I thought I would. Just being around people doing their jobs with respect and kindness, catching up with old friends, and meeting friendly and gracious people reminded me that this country is full of good citizens who do care about each other. I’ll hold on to this hope as long as I can.

So many birds, so tired

Today Pamela and I drove from Corpus Christi to port Aransas and back before returning home. For that reason I’m tired as heck so I’m hitting the highlights.

Hello, I’m a highlight, Tricolored Heron.

First we drove down Shoreline Blvd in Corpus, where I’d never been. Whoa. There were beautiful old and newer homes to see! Corpus is t as ugly as it appears from the highway. We then went to a small and kind of rundown bird sanctuary, the Hans and Pat Suter Wildlife Sanctuary. We saw many interesting birds, plants and hundreds of Great Southern White butterflies. Enchanting.

After than visit we drove all across Mustang Island, which was new to my native Texan friend. It’s my dream marshland. Eventually we got to the Leonabelle Turner Birding Center.

As this photo shows, the wind was not kind to Pamela’s hair.

Nor was it kind to mine. It got stuck in trees.

There weren’t zillions of birds like the time I came during migration, but there were some good ones.

The best, most wonderful, and the most amazing sight we saw did not come through in photos, but was very clear through my binoculars. At first I thought it was Mississippi Kites, but they weren’t marked quite right, and their tails were forked, but very long. So when I got home I looked to see if kites were likely birds in Port Aransas this time of year. They were not.

What was large, flocking, black-and-white, and likely? The Magnificent Frigatebird! A bucket list bird of mine!

This is one cool seabird. I didn’t realize they’d come this close to the shore. They can fly for hours and hours and steal food from shorebirds (I guess that was today’s plan).

Otoño this picture to document where the birds were. She’s looking at them, I swear!

I immediately had to text Pamela about the ID. This was a memorable trip, even though the drive home was long!

Apologies for not sharing the plants I saw. Too tired!

Birds of radically different feathers

My day today started off with spending a good while just watching a pair of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds flitting around and hanging out.

Usually if there are two males, they chase each other to defend their territory, but this male and female were just hanging out and maybe flirting. It was very calming to observe.

Bunnies were hard to distinguish from Lee’s mowing clumps.

The day (very long) ended with Kathleen presenting me with one of her diamond painting crafts. I knew she made them, but had never seen one before. I guessed (correctly) that she wasn’t surprising me with beautiful flowers, because she was suppressing a laugh as she came up to me, holding something behind her back. What was it? Well, she knows how much I like birds, so she tested my love of my avian friends by making me a bird I couldn’t like.

He’s watching me from the fireplace now.

I laughed so hard. It’s so nice and sparkly! It’s just the perfect gag gift! I love how we can poke fun at each other and enjoy stuff like this. We can all use a good laugh to keep us going.

Meanwhile, I did my nails all patriotic in preparation for a weekend trip. This polish looks like those rocket popsicles.

I’ll try to write tomorrow. I’m stepping out of my comfort zone.

Book Report: The History of Birds

Don’t write this book off as yet another Suna bird book. Oh, no. This book is for birders, dinosaur lovers, biologists, and those who love Latin. I spent much of my time sounding out the names of dinosaurs, but the author of The History of Birds, Steve Brusatte, got me so invested in all the ancient and modern animals he introduced that I actually kept them straight!

Spoiler alert: birds are dinosaurs. That’s the main thesis of this one. But the fun part is learning how a bunch of dedicated scientists and amateurs figured that out.

Brusatte is a good story teller and a great interpreter of paleontology for us regular people. Each fossil discovery is a little mystery that unfolds through stories. Plus, I learned a lot about the history of Earth. I was fascinated at how the formation of continents influenced how birds evolved.

Another part of the bird history that was fun was how the prehistoric world comes alive with Brusatte’s vivid descriptions of the environment, plants, animals, and weather patterns. It’s like a fun trip through history.

How birds learned to fly, how feathers developed, and how birdsong works are all covered. You’ll feel real smart when you finish reading, and you’ll be so entertained by the birds and dinosaurs and the scientists who love them—the interdisciplinary community that has contributed to what we now know about birds seems tight knit and so cooperative. It encourages me!

Analyzing my bird sightings

Yesterday I worked on adding up how many bird species I observed here at the Hermits’ Rest last month. I was happy to have seen 126 different species as the migration season drew to a close. I was wondering if there was a seasonal pattern, because I intuited that the spring and autumn migration seasons would bring in more species.

Speaking of birds, I’m not sure if this sparrow nest addendum was on purpose.

I don’t remember exactly what I did, but somehow Excel asked me if I wanted an analysis of the data. Well, yes, I did, because data analysis using spreadsheets is not one of my skill sets. I had all kinds of questions that I’d like answered, like what were the most common species, which species have been here every month, etc.

Suddenly, BOOM. a new tab opened on the spreadsheet. It had all the answers. Something had analyzed my spreadsheet. Oh no, I found a use for AI! Damn! I couldn’t not look at the results. I really wanted to know.

Right on top, there was a summary of my ranch bird data:

The sheet is a month-by-species presence matrix: an X means a bird was recorded in that month. Coverage spans Dec-23 through May-26, with 2,804 total monthly presence marks. May-25 is the richest month (129 species); Jul-24 is the quietest (60 species). 18 species appear in every month, suggesting reliable year-round residents. 30 species appear in only one month, highlighting possible migrants, one-off observations, or rare sightings.

That’s all the stuff I wanted to know! To top it all off, there were tables and charts! Look at this.

I was wrong about the seasons. Winter, with all those sparrows, has the second most sightings, after what I expected…that spring gets the most.

This one is probably my favorite. I wonder, though, how we got so many species last June, when the previous June, July, and August were so low (and this June is starting off pretty slow). What I really think is that I need another couple of years of data to see these patterns better. Here’s another graph:

These are the 18 birds we see every month, with two that occur almost every month. I am not at all surprised at the species I see here. I wasn’t sure that Eastern Bluebirds were here every month. I don’t see them every day, but I guess they are here. Okay, one final fascinating thing.

These are supposedly the birds we’ve only seen once. That’s pretty interesting, but look! There are weird spellings on the birds, which I assure you are spelled correctly on the original spreadsheet. I probably shouldn’t have asked for a red border. I wonder what a Swalver is? And I think those last two are both Virginia Rails. But it appears only once on my list. I went too far.

What are my conclusions? In summary, AI is helpful upon occasion, but AI always does weird stuff to the data. Here’s the actual data of birds that were only seen once.

American Golden-plover
American Tree Sparrow
Barn Owl
Bay-breasted Warbler
Black Capped Chickadee
Black Tern
Black-and-white Warbler
Black-necked Stilt
Boat-tailed Grackle
Canada Warbler
Caspian Tern
Chestnut-collared Longspur
Chuck-Will’s Widow
Common Raven
Crested Lark
Greater White-fronted Goose
Hooded Warbler
Indian Peafowl
Lark Bunting
Olive-sided Flycatcher
Pyrrhuloxia
Rough-winged Swallow
Semi-palmated Plover
Semi-palmated Sandpiper
Spotless Starling
Thick-billed Longspur
Tricolored Heron
Virginia Rail
Western Wood Pewee
Yellow-green Vireo

Dang, I’m ambivalent. But now I know stuff about my bird data. I am pleased about that.

I was not quite so pleased when I sleepily ventured onto the screened porch to guzzle some coffee before my 8 am standup (once again it went 30 minutes over). I went to set my coffee down and spotted a snakeskin on the arm of my chair. You know I’ve lived here a while, because all I did was ask Lee if he put it there. Nope. I set the skin on my big turtle shell where it looks quite decorative.

I guess the rat snake left the way it came in when it realized there were no birds or rodents to snack on. Ah, it’s always something!

The great outdoors? It’s great!

Today I took every possible chance I had to go outside and take a break. I was rewarded with some fun and educational sights. First thing this morning, I went out to check the rain gauge. To my delight, I spotted a pair of Great Egrets under the willow tree in the pond.

I enjoyed them for a few minutes. Then I got my binoculars out of the birding hut to see them better. I quickly realized there was also our Great Blue Heron on the shore, sitting on his favorite grass tussock.

I looked back over at the willow tree and found a third and fourth Great Egret! I wonder if they’re related?

Just as I thought I was finished I heard a familiar squawk. Yes! A third egret! One of our nesting pair of Green Egrets came over to check out the action.

That was enough for me, but when I came back to the porch, Lee spotted our loudest summer resident, a Superb Dog-day Cicada (Neotibicen superbus). These buddies sure make my bird listening difficult.

When I went out to check the mail, I stopped to look at our little mud pond by the driveway. I spotted a very busy crawfish moving mud around to build its home. I was fascinated.

Red Swamp Crayfish (***Procambarus clarkii)***

I’ve always loved these guys, which we called crawdads in Florida. They’re mud bugs in many parts of Louisiana. They eat mud and filter nutrients out of it. Fascinating crustaceans!

After work, feeding animals, and eating a yummy dinner (ironically, featuring crawfish—Kathleen did not know I’d been looking at them), we went for a walk. Kathleen made it to the dumpster with a bag of trash, but I got all fascinated by the crawfish again.

We realized there are dozens of crawfish in the little muddy pond, big ones and small ones, all busily doing whatever they do.

There was a small puddle being guarded by a larger one, who busily herded small intruders. Those claws stuck out above the water menacingly! We just stood there and laughed delightedly. We needed that.

Then we witnessed crawfish mating, which came as a surprise. It starts with the female fighting the male, then they settle down to laying eggs and fertilizing. The female will carry the eggs until they hatch out as tiny versions of the adults.

Kathleen wondered why we didn’t see any shed exoskeletons in the water. I also was curious, so I looked it up. Turns out they eat them! they recycle the nutrients and skeletal material. Uh, they also eat their poop. I think I’ll do a longer article on crawfish for the Master Naturalist blog. I’ll be sure to share the link.

That was plenty of nature fun for one day. We are definitely easy to entertain, but that’s part of our charm, our husbands would say!

Geez. I care about my phone.

What personal belongings do you hold most dear?

Why do I hold my phone dear? It is my memory. It contains all my photos, all my communication with friends, access to my memories in the blog…and yes, I can get to all those things from my laptop. Yuck. I think I hold some bits and bytes or whatever cloud storage is made of. That’s really depressing. What else do I hold dear? Things made by my loved ones. My mom and stepmom’s art. Dad’s woodcraft stuff. Gifts they gave me. Things that tie me to them.

New thought: I’ve started letting myself write in incomplete sentences! They’ll soon be taking away my Grammar Police badge. My take is that the incomplete sentences are not as unpleasant as those two blogs I dictated and then was too woozy to properly review. Poor Sue had to endure proofreading that. I don’t pay her well enough for that! (I do not pay Sue; she’s just nice.)

Another part of the phone I love is the camera. I was at a Master Naturalist outing at my friend Carolyn’s place, which I’ve showed you before. I got some images I really liked there. I don’t need to show you all 125 species or 25 birds I recorded, but I want to share a few for those of you who always want more nature pictures.

Purple Pleatleaf (***Alophia drummondii)***

This one was new to me. It’s an evening primrose that grows five feet tall. Wow.

Four point evening primrose (***Oenothera rhombipetala)***

And here are a few more plants.

We also saw lots of animal life. There was more than I expected, especially the suspiciously friendly raccoon. But it’s harmless.

Other animal news? No one’s come looking for Benny. He’s still over here trying to hump Carlton.

What bugs me?

Quickly, since the weather’s turning icky again.

Mosquitoes. They ate what bugs me. Of course they aren’t bugs. They are insects. We are overrun with them right now thanks to the previous storm and a much smaller barn swallow population than usual. I guess our new porch miffed them by taking two prime nesting spots away.

After riding around in the pasture on Sunday looking at the grass situation, then pulling a lot of weeds yesterday, I’m covered with bites. And once I get a certain amount of Culex spit in me, the itching is unbearable. I start to feel better, then more arrive. Gonna have to use all my organic and scary repellent methods. I have few bite-free surfaces. Ugh.

I’m sure glad my honorary daughter gave birth to her chunky and adorable son safely today. That helps balance out the sad things from yesterday. I guess I was on target yesterday !

Hey, Sweetums, the babies need to be fed and I’m exhausted.

Stay safe if storms, fires, random shootings, or killer mosquitoes are after you. Remember I care, even if I don’t know you in real life. You matter.

And Carlton would lick you if you were here. But he’s hiding from thunder right now.

Purple Martin Mania

I’m still easily tired and low on energy, but I’m glad I was able to go to see the incredible Purple Mountain colony maintained by Mike McCormick and his family near Buckholts. Not only were the birds (a type of swallow) beautiful to watch, but I enjoyed finding plenty of plants, too.

Two stunning males taking a break from insect hunting.

This huge setup of houses and a “condo” is one of the largest in the US. It’s the result of a lifetime of work. We are lucky to be nearby and that our Master Naturalist group has been friends for years.

The setting couldn’t be more beautiful, in a hilly ranch with mixed fields and woods. There are plenty of ponds to attract insects and keep the birds hydrated.

Pond, cattle, and chickens share the land with martins.

It’s a lot of work maintaining all the nest sites, but it’s a labor of love for the whole family. They’ve been responsible for many Martin housing innovations that they share with others, too. There’s a devoted group of Martin lovers throughout North America who provide homes for these birds while the raise their babies each summer who share information.

Two females in the condo, taking a break from egg incubation.

I enjoyed learning new things about these birds, which surprised me since I’ve been educated often about them. For example, larger hawks ignore them, but Cooper’s and Sharp-shinned find martins tasty. Ah, nature.

The houses and condo unit. It holds lots of birds. There are up to 2,000 pairs in good years.

I couldn’t resist the other life around the property. There were plenty of hens and roosters, plus chicks. And there were beautiful white domestic doves fluttering around (as well as Mourning, White Winged, and Inca Doves). The shed area had Barn Swallows nesting in it, so we got to watch them zooming around, too. And a pretty brave rabbit.

After I got tired of being around people, I walked on the little nature trail they’ve built since I was last there. It has very nice bathrooms, too. I had lots of fun adding 75 or so observations for iNaturalist on the trail and in the fields, when I wasn’t distracted by how beautiful the views of the countryside were.

It is a privilege to see this place again and to learn even more about these migratory birds and the environment where they spend their spring and summer, after flying in from Brazil.