Cave Swallows

Steven McDonald and I spent a little over an hour this evening birding Lake Creek Trail near Parmer Village. We were trying to find a Harris's Sparrow which has been reported there recently by Gracen Duffield. We did not find the sparrow, but on our way back Steven spotted a group of about 70 swallows flying over the Parmer Lane bridge. When we got closer I saw and heard that they were Cave Swallows and got this picture. It was an impressive sight, watching them swirl around in the air. And just as I was looking down they all disappeared under the bridge to roost. This was the first large group of swallows I've seen this year. As the sun set we watched several flocks of ducks fly over, mostly Northern Shovelers with a few Green-winged Teal. Just before we left 4 Ring-necked Ducks landed in the drainage pond. I got this picture off towards the T&C playing fields.

Cold and Clear, Signs of Spring

This morning I birded the neighborhood but I kept to the streets, covering a little over 3 miles. I visited some streets I haven't been on in awhile, including Sherbrook, Springvale, Dalewood, Parkland and Longvale. The morning was cold and clear. It was freezing when I started at about 7:30, and I think it was in the low 50s when I got back home. There were more signs of spring today -- birds were singing quite a bit, including a few American Robins. Several woodpeckers were drumming on power line posts (their version of singing). And many trees are budding. On Stillforest I got this picture of a Red-shouldered Hawk, perched near a nest that they used last spring. I hope they raise another brood there this summer.

On Meadowheath I came across a large tree full of newly produced seeds and full of American Goldfinches eating them. I estimated that there were 80 birds in 2 or 3 trees in the same immediate area. I got this picture of one of them eating seeds.


Redbuds are exploding with color and I got this picture of one on Sherbourne.


On Springvale Drive I ran into a nice mixed species foraging flock that had Carolina Chickadees, Northern Cardinals, Yellow-rumped Warblers, a Ruby-crowned Kinglet, an Orange-crowned Warbler, and a Pine Warbler, a bird I rarely see in the neighborhood. I got this picture of the Pine Warbler. It's not that good, but it's the best I've gotten of this species so far.


Some other notable birds this morning were a Cooper's Hawk, a Sharp-shinned Hawk, and the first Common Grackles I've seen in the neighborhood this year. (They seem to disappear from the neighborhood for a month or 2 in the winter.) Another first for the year was a single male Purple Martin. I heard its gurgling song and found it flying in the sky almost directly over my house.

Cold Front

This morning my neighbor Steven McDonald and I birded most of Lake Creek Trail starting at the new Braes Valley parking lot. At 7:30 the birds were singing like crazy. We found 47 species, including 2 birds I have not seen since 2008: a single Brown Thrasher and a single Chipping Sparrow, both spotted by Steven near the end of Holbrook Street. For the past couple winters I have usually been able to find Chipping Sparrows in this area, but not this winter. We worked our way down the trail to the last dam. On the creek we found Green-winged Teal, Blue-winged Teal, Gadwall, Northern Shoveler, 1 Pied-billed Grebe, 1 Spotted Sandpiper, and 1 Belted Kingfisher. We were rained on a bit around 8:45 and by 9:30 the cold front arrived in full force. The north wind kicked up and the temperature dropped 15 or 20 degrees. We had a long, cold walk through the T&C playing fields back to the Braes Valley parking lot!

Hermit Thrush, Ducks, and Osprey

I was out all morning birding the neighborhood, and the first half of the morning was cold and overcast. But there were several sings of spring, like budding trees and singing birds. White-winged Doves and Northern Mockingbirds were 2 species I heard singing this morning that I have not heard yet this year. At Chester Forest and Stillforest, 2 Red-shouldered Hawks were checking out their old nest from last year. One was in the nest rooting around until I got too close, then the other hawk called a few times and they both flew off.

The T&C playing fields were completely empty today. So I birded their north parking lot off Briarwick Drive, which I haven't birded in awhile since it's usually full of cars and people. By the dumpster I was able to call up this Hermit Thrush with a recording and I got these 2 pictures. These small winter-resident birds are related to American Robins but prefer staying in the dense underbrush.


The different species of thrushes look very similar, but one way to recognize the Hermit Thrush is by the reddish-brown color in the tail and wingtips, which you can see in this second photo. (So far, the only other thrush I've seen in the neighborhood is Swainson's Thrush, only during migration.)


By this time the sun finally came out and things started to warm up. I made my way back to the creek and was pleased to find 5 species of ducks on 2 of the dammed up areas: Northern Shoveler, Gadwall, American Wigeon, Green-winged Teal, and Blue-winged Teal. I didn't want to scare them off, so I only got this low resolution photo of a male Gadwall (top) and a male Green-winged Teal from far away. I hope I can get better pictures of these beatiful ducks soon!


Nearby and a little downstream I was, once again, privileged to get very close to 2 hunting Osprey. And this time I got my best photos yet as these cool birds circled low over the creek looking for fish.


This weekend is the Great Backyard Bird Count. So in addition to logging my bird observations into eBird, I also submitted them to the GBBC. You can see what species people in Austin have found so far here.

Ruts and Ducks

I birded the neighborhood for about 4 hours this morning, starting at Parmer Village. I spent about an hour in the marshy area near the Parmer Lane bridge. This area is intriguing to me since it's the only habitat of this kind in the neighborhood. Unfortunately it's also one of the remaining areas along the creek where people are still riding ATVs. They come in by the bridge and this picture shows a rut left by one. This marshy area is the only place I've found Marsh Wrens (but not this morning), and it could potentially have some other interesting species hidden in the reeds. This morning I found many Swamp Sparrows, Lincoln's Sparrows, and Song Sparrows. I got this picture of one of the Song Sparrows.


Another place ATVs are getting in is by the new flood control wall near Saddlebrook Trail. I've emailed a couple people in Williamson County asking if we can block access with boulders, like we have at other points along the creek. Hopefully I'll hear back from them soon. A small tributary creek goes along this wall and joins Lake Creek. It's a good place to find birds and this morning I got this picture of an Orange-crowned Warbler there. It's the first picture of an Orange-crowned Warbler I've gotten that actually shows a trace of its orange crown.


I was happy to find 5 species of ducks this morning. In the past year or 2 ducks have gotten much less common during winter on the creek. I think this is because of the recent Parmer Village and Lake Creek Trail construction projects. Now that those are mostly complete, I am hoping to see more ducks again. In the Parmer Village drainage pond there were American Wigeons, Ring-necked Ducks, and Gadwall. On the creek I found 7 Green-winged Teal, which were in beautiful plumage. But I was afraid I'd scare them away if I got close enough to take a good picture. I did get this decent picture of Northern Shovelers a little farther upstream.

Shortly after I took this picture an Osprey flew over, and both the teal and these shovelers were spooked and flew off.

Goodbye Doreen Scholtes

This morning I learned that Doreen Scholtes passed away, after a long battle with cancer and MDS. For many years Doreen was the Information Officer of NASWC. Her strong belief in our local community and government was inspiring, and her enthusiasm was infectious. I met Doreen in August of 2006. I was excited about all the birds I was finding in the neighborhood, and I wanted a way to share my experiences with the community. Doreen liked my ideas of writing a neighborhood birding column and leading monthly bird walks, so that's how Birding on Broadmeade got started.

I knew Doreen mostly from her emails. We exchanged hundreds, usually about upcoming eblasts and columns, and local goings on. Her rich knowledge of the history of our neighborhood would come through in tidbits like this one:

And Forest North was so named because our area was known to the locals as the North Forest. A police officer who grew up in Riviera Springs in Cedar Park used to play in our neighborhood. He told me that everyone knew of our spring-sodden and heavily wooded area as The North Forest. Cool huh?

About the old Pond Springs Cemetery she wrote,

I know the cemetery well. We used to do rubbings on the stones over there before the first revamp took a lot of them out. The school children of Forest North got an historical marker placed on 620 years ago for that graveyard, long before SH-45 ripped through and took it out. In fact, that was before there was even a Lake Creek Parkway going through there!
...
Aside: did you know that we had one private graveyard located along Lake Creek? It was on private property near or on the State Farm tract. If you ever see the headstones, but I doubt they are still there, while you are birding, please snap the shots!

(I have not yet found any sign of the private graveyard.)

With Doreen's promotion, my column was well received by the neighborhood and a few people even showed up for my bird walks. I felt like a real member of the community rather than just a resident. In 2007 Doreen and I were excited about the construction of the new Lake Creek Trail, and we worked together to get the county to post No Dumping signs and place boulders to block vehicle access. In 2008 our emails decreased as Doreen became more ill. My last emails with her were in September and October, when I was serving on the nomination committee for the NASWC elections. She gave me great advice that showed her strong belief in democracy and local government:

Understand that we have in place a board of directors, officers, a nominating committee, and the membership wisdom. If someone appears who wants to take on an officer’s job but is not qualified, then those four levels of NASWC Stewardship have NOT done their job if they promote that person to that level. They have treated it like an insignificant position, which it is not. And there is no Junior position when it comes to officers. No such thing exists in our Bylaws.

Then she drilled down from these general ideas into how they should be carried out in our election process and the workings of the NASWC bylaws. When I asked about the status of her own position, Information Officer, she replied:

It is time to warm someone else up in the locker room for my job. ... It is hard letting go but even harder having the problems associated with these two cancers and Sweet's disease. Ugh. But hey, I've done this for about 11 years! Time for another to improve on what I've done and make great things happen.

And that's what she believed. A neighborhood association full of average folks can make great things happen. She made me believe it. I'll dearly miss her.

NASWC Bird Walk

This morning 10 of us enjoyed a cool and clear morning finding 42 species of birds for the February NASWC Bird Walk. In the past I've had only 1 person, or even no one show up for these walks. But now several times we've broken into the double digits. That's great! Here are some highlights from this morning:

• We found 4 species of ducks. In the new drainage pond in front of the Parmer Village model homes there were 20 Ring-necked Ducks, 13 American Wigeon, and 5 Gadwall. Later on we got distant looks at about 6 Northern Shovelers on the creek.
• An early sign of spring was that many birds were singing. Several times we heard Carolina Wrens and Northern Cardinals singing at the same time, offering a great opportunity to learn how to distinguish between these 2 similar-sounding species. This Red-winged Blackbird flew in, perched right above us, and sang for about 5 minutes.



• We saw more American Robins this morning than I've seen all winter. At one point a flock of about 60 flew right over us.
• This Northern Flicker, an uncommon winter resident woodpecker in the neighborhood, perched across the creek right out in the open. It was a little too far away for my camera, so the picture I got is pretty low resolution.
  



• An Osprey flew over us several times, low above the creek. We did not see it dive for a fish this time, but it was still beautiful to see.
  
• We watched a Belted Kingfisher dive and take minnows out of the creek 4 or 5 times in a row. Each time it flew back to its perch and we could see something small and silvery wriggling in its beak for a few seconds before being swallowed.
• Where Lake Creek Trail meets the eastern edge of the T&C playing fields we saw several small bird species, including Yellow Rumped Warbler (actually showing off their yellow rumps in the sun), Orange-crowned Warbler, Field Sparrow, and American Goldfinch.