Big Sit 2021

The annual Great Texas Birding Classic birdwatching competition was held this spring. And for the second year in a row, I organized team Birding on Broadmeade to participate in the Big Sit category, in the Heart of Texas East region. Last year TPWD delayed the competition until the fall because of the pandemic, but this year it returned to the spring and we were ready for it! The Big Sit category challenges teams to identify as many species of birds as they can from one spot (a 50 foot diameter circle) in one day.

Previous Big Sits we've done on Lake Creek Trail have been on the east end, at a nice spot on the trail right next to the creek. But spring is the time of migrating songbirds, and we have learned over the years that more migrating songbirds show up on the west end. So where was our spot this year? We thought long and hard about it and finally decided on the Braes Valley trail head. There's visibility into several patches of woods, there's open sky, and hey what do you know, there's already a circle that's just about the right size!

So how did it go? 

It was great! Despite a weather forecast of rain all day, the rain held off until about 2 PM and lasted until 5:30 or so. And we had a beautiful middle morning to early afternoon. Since most of the team lives in the neighborhood, we went home when the rain started and returned after it had passed.

And the birds cooperated. On Saturday, May 1st, we started at 5:15 AM and stopped about 14.5 hours later at 7:45 PM. We saw or heard 73 distinct species of birds. This smashed our previous record of 61 species in 2019! 23 of these species were north-bound migrants, and included 10 species of warblers. Moving our sit spot really paid off.

We won!

For the first time ever, Birding on Broadmeade got first place out of the 13 teams in the Heart of Texas East area. And the top three were all Austin teams!

The Great Texas Birding classic uses team registration fees and corporate sponsorships to fund conservation projects. As winners of our region, team Birding on Broadmeade gets to choose what project a $1000 conservation grant will fund out of a list of projects that applied. I hope there's a local one on the list!

The official results for all teams are posted here. Big thanks to team members Craig Browning, Matt Denton, Rich Kostecke, Helen Mastrangelo, Steven McDonald, and Barry Noret. I can't wait to do it again next year!

Video, Photos, and Species list

Here are some video highlights:

Here are a few photos on Flickr.

And here's our complete bird list along with the time when each was first observed:

No.	Species	Time
1	Northern Cardinal	5:26 AM
2	Great-tailed Grackle	5:35 AM
3	White-winged Dove	5:45 AM
4	Dickcissel	5:51 AM
5	Blue Jay	6:08 AM
6	Purple Martin	6:08 AM
7	Great Crested Flycatcher	6:18 AM
8	Carolina Wren	6:27 AM
9	Common Grackle	6:32 AM
10	Yellow-breasted Chat	6:33 AM
11	American Crow	6:36 AM
12	Bewick’s Wren	6:36 AM
13	European Starling	6:38 AM
14	Chimney Swift	6:41 AM
15	Mourning Dove	6:43 AM
16	Yellow-crowned Night-Heron	6:43 AM
17	Brown-headed Cowbird	6:44 AM
18	Red-winged Blackbird	6:49 AM
19	Rose-breasted Grosbeak	6:51 AM
20	Orange-crowned Warbler	6:52 AM
21	Red-bellied Woodpecker	6:52 AM
22	Nashville Warbler	6:54 AM
23	hummingbird sp.	6:55 AM
24	Clay-colored Sparrow	6:56 AM
25	American Redstart	6:58 AM
26	Upland Sandpiper	6:59 AM
27	Chestnut-sided Warbler	7:01 AM
28	Swainson’s Thrush	7:02 AM
29	Painted Bunting	7:07 AM
30	Cedar Waxwing	7:08 AM
31	Common Yellowthroat	7:09 AM
32	Pine Siskin	7:14 AM
33	Gray-cheeked Thrush	7:17 AM
34	Lincoln’s Sparrow	7:25 AM
35	House Sparrow	7:26 AM
36	Least Flycatcher	7:35 AM
37	Orchard Oriole	7:37 AM
38	Green Heron	7:38 AM
39	Barn Swallow	7:38 AM
40	Cliff Swallow	7:38 AM
41	Yellow Warbler	7:40 AM
42	Baltimore Oriole	7:40 AM
43	House Finch	7:42 AM
44	Lesser Goldfinch	7:43 AM
45	Downy Woodpecker	7:47 AM
46	Warbling Vireo	7:52 AM
47	Carolina Chickadee	7:54 AM
48	Cave Swallow	7:54 AM
49	Mourning Warbler	8:42 AM
50	Northern Mockingbird	8:45 AM
51	Ovenbird	8:47 AM
52	Black-bellied Whistling Duck	8:52 AM
53	Crested Caracara	8:53 AM
54	Black Vulture	8:54 AM
55	Summer Tanager	9:02 AM
56	Ladder-backed Woodpecker	9:10 AM
57	Gray Catbird	9:19 AM
58	Great Blue Heron	9:21 AM
59	Chipping Sparrow	9:29 AM
60	Turkey Vulture	9:32 AM
61	Red-shouldered Hawk	9:36 AM
62	Mississippi Kite	9:48 AM
63	Cooper’s Hawk	10:18 AM
64	Broad-winged Hawk	10:37 AM
65	Wilson’s Warbler	11:54 AM
66	Black-crested Titmouse	12:43 PM
67	Swainson’s Hawk	12:45 PM
68	Killdeer	12:55 PM
69	Sharp-shinned Hawk	1:13 PM
70	Black-and-white Warbler	5:45 PM
71	Osprey	7:20 PM
72	Western Kingbird	7:24 PM
73	Common Nighthawk	7:25 PM