Another Life Bird

   Last night the emergency announcement system told us to leave the hotel in an orderly manner. We dressed and walked calmly to the stairs, but we smelled smoke in the hallway. After a short time, the Dallas fire department came with sirens blazing, then the manager sheepishly admitted that it was burnt popcorn in a microwave on the ninth floor.

   We drove out of Dallas and visited several lakes in the foresty part of eastern Texas. This is "close" to where we saw the Red Cockaded Woodpecker several years ago. Tall hardwood forest turning into a huge pine forest just north of the coast. Berry and I search for birdically interesting habitats, places with clean water, food that birds like to eat, and shelter from the elements, where birds would find it amenable. This led us to a reservoir called Cedar Creek.

   We counted umpteen American Coot on the surface of the reservoir. Then Berry spotted a Lesser Scaup. When she saw another bird, we both thought it was a Redhead. But this one had a perfectly black beak. I looked in the Sibley's and was amazed to identify the unknown duck as a Canvasback. This was a "life bird" for us. A life bird is one which we had never seen before. The list to the right of this post is our "Life List". Please note that we have added this new bird at the bottom of that list. We are delighted.

Canvasback (Aythya valisineria)

   We birded several other lakes on our way south, Athens Lake, Lake Palestine, Sam Rayburn Reservoir and really enjoyed poking down some infrequently used country lanes on our way to Beaumont, Texas. Here is a list of the birds that we saw.

• Turkey Vulture
  
• Lesser Scaup
  
• American Coot
  
• Canvasback
  
• Field Sparrow
  
• Rock Dove
  
• English Sparrow
  
• Black Vulture
  
• Swamp Sparrow
  
• European Starling
  
• Northern Mockingbird
  
• American Crow
  
• Great Egret
  
• Red Tail Hawk (white morph)
  
• female Northern Cardinal
  
• White Throated Sparrow
  
• Carolina Chickadee
  
• Killdeer
  
• Eastern Phoebe
  
• Bald Eagle
  
• Mallard
  
• Yellow Rumped Warbler
  
• American Robin
  
• Eastern Bluebird
  

   In addition to birds, we observed two coyotes feeding on carrion by the road, two gray squirrels munching nuts beside the road, and two white tailed deer dodging our car.

Robert

photo courtesy of jkennedy