Howard and I spent several days, during the Thanksgiving holiday at South Llano River State Park. Because, it was a holiday weekend the campground was full and crowded. Lots of people enjoying this beautiful park, birding, walking, hiking, biking and fishing.
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Of course some of us were enjoying taking photos. More to come from South Llano River State Park.
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I am writing this post from Lafayette, Louisiana, arriving today after spending three nights in Beaumont, TX. The birding at Cattail Marsh in Beaumont was wonderful! We met some expert birds while out on the pier, giving us some great advice on birding along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coasts. Wouldn’t it be fun to attend a couple “Birding Counts” in this area?
Hopefully, next winter we can spend a few weeks down on the Texas Gulf Coast birding. Yeah!!
I am so far behind in posting; hopefully I will catch up soon. I have a few more photos from Catalina State Park to share, and photos from Rock Hound State Park in Deming New Mexico; South Llano River State Park in Junction, TX; McKinney Falls State Park near Austin; and Cattail Marsh in Beaumont.
Howard and I are enjoying our journey…. meeting with friends along the way, eating some delicious food (we had Crawfish Étouffée for lunch) and persuing our hobbies as best we can on the road. I even got to play a couple hours of Pickleball with friends in Austin, which made me extremely happy.
We haven’t seen rain for many, many weeks; I bet we will see some very soon!
A few more bird photos from our stay at South Llano River State Park; I think I am getting close to publishing all of them.
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I only saw this Yellow Warbler once; flew in to get a drink of water and flew away. Might have been nesting.
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This male House Finch is starting to show his breeding colors.
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Summer Tanager (male)
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This Carolina Chickadee just didn’t want his photo taken.
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These beautiful doves are easy to photograph, they are slow moving and like to perch for extended periods of time. They were plentiful in South Llano River State park this past Spring. The males were beginning to show subtle breeding colors, brighter red feet and legs, and yellowish hues around the back of neck. We only get to see them while traveling south. They have a limited range in the US, mostly Texas.
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I was sitting in one of the blinds when a Texas farmer came in and sat down. He was very friendly and a good photographer. He commented on the large number of White-winged Doves we were seeing. He stated him and his wife have too many doves around their farm. I could tell by the way he spoke, they didn’t seem to care for these doves. I’am not sure if they caused them problems or they just didn’t like them. Maybe they ate too much bird seed!
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This from Wikipedia- “The white-winged dove is a dove whose native range extends from the south-western United States through Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. In recent years with increasing urbanization and backyard feeding, it has expanded throughout Texas, into Oklahoma, Louisiana and coastal Mississippi. It has also been introduced to Florida.”
It was nice this Titmouse had a sunflower seed in its mouth and was intend on eating. They are always flitting around, never still.
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It takes a contortionist to eat a little seed.
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Located in western Texas, they prefer oak woods and feed on insects and seeds. My first sighting of this bird was back on 11/20/2008, at South Llano River State Park.
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