The invasion of Mexican vagrant birds into the Rio Grande Valley continued this weekend with a young male Elegant Trogon joining the White-throated Robin and Crimson-collared Grosbeaks already at Frontera Audubon thicket. They make the Black-headed Grosbeak, a rare bird down here in it’s own right seem rather mundane. My little birding patch is less fun these days with the hoards of visiting birders down here.

Meanwhile an Additional Crimson-collared Grosbeak joined the Blue Bunting in Laredo and an additional Blue Bunting was found at Santa Ana NWR. More Rose-throated Becards showed up at Chapeno and Santa Ana NRW. The Social Flycatcher at Bentson State Park has not been seen for a few days.

Saturday afternoon my wife and I made a run out to South Padre Island just to see something different. We checked out a mystery warbler that had been reported earlier and found a first winter Prairie Warbler which is one of the harder to find warblers down here.

This is a list of Mexican vagrants seen in the Rio Grande Valley of south Texas during the past two months. It’s been a few months since the Blue Mockingbird and Black-headed Nightingale-Thrush have been seen.

Green-breasted Mango
Rose-throated Becard
Social Flycatcher (2nd US record)
Dusky-capped Flycatcher (3rd US record of lawrencei subspecies)
White-throated Robin (4th and 5th US records)
Golden-crowned Warbler
Gray-crowned Yelowthroat
Crimson-collared Grosbeak (9th – ? US records)
Blue Bunting

Lately I’ve been doing a lot of that kind of birding that I don’t really enjoy. Standing around with a bunch of other birders waiting for some mega-rarity to show up. This weekend I had one long wait and one short. Saturday morning I made the third try for White-throated Robin and after two hours of scouring the underbrush by binoculars with twenty other birders finally got a brief but good look at this fifth USA record. I had already seen the second and third records but it makes for a nice year and patch bird. I hate it when I’m not the first to see the bird and have to endure the patience of other nice birders trying to help me find the bird.

Saturday afternoon I wanted to do some real birding so my wife Honey and I headed over to the Anacua Unit of Las Palomas Wildlife Area. This is a state owned piece of land set aside mostly for hunting purposed and is rarley birded. This is a shame because it has some really neat habitat along the Rio Grande. I think most birders are a bit intimidated by having to deal with Border Patrol and the possibility of running into illegal migrants and drug smugglers. Anyway we had a good afternoon with a great look at a beautiful female plumaged Rose-throated Becard. Finding a TBRC review species is always exciting. This is at least the fifth one found during this bizaar season of Mexican vagrants. We also scored with a wintering Least Flycatcher and seven species of warblers.

After we got home I found the Social Flycatcher discovered on Friday had been refound. Now I’ve seen lots of Social Flycatchers in Mexico but this is only the second US record. So Honey and I got up early on Sunday and drove over to Bentson State Park and the poorly named World Birding Center. As we walked in successful birders were already leaving and running to their cars to make the drive over to Weslaco for the robin and grosbeak. We got to spot where it had been seen a few minutes earlier. It started raining and looked like we might be in for a long day. John Arvin who discovered the bird arrived in a few minutes with other birders and played a short call on the tape. Nothing happened. The group walked a ways down the road. As I walked to catch up with them I passed where they had played the tape and heard the bird call. A few minutes later I found the bird for the rest of the group. I like it better when it happens that way. Not too much else exciting. We say a couple of nice Gray Hawks and heard Northern Beardless Tyrannulet.

A White-throated Robin was found on Jan. 2 at the amazing Frontera Audubon Thicket in Weslaco. Staging its own mini-invasion, this is the third sighting of this Mexican Turdid species for the Rio Grande Valley in the past two weeks. Even though I saw all four of the 1998 birds, I’m still unhappy about dipping twice in my attemps to see this bird this week. The bird was seen yesterday with an unbelievable five Clay-colored Robins. I’ll give it another go on Sat.

Two male Crimson-collared Grosbeaks continue as does the wintering Summer Tanagers, Ovenbird, Tropical Parula, and Wilson’s, Black-throated Green, Black-and white and Yellow-throated Warblers. I haven’t seen the Dusky-capped Flycatcher since Jan. 1. Yesterday I heard rumors of Veery, Wood Thrush and Western Tanager but I’ll believe it when I see it.

Checked my email on the morning of Dec. 31 and found that an immature Black-legged Kittywake had been found at the Boca Chica jetty. My wife Honey was tired from our all day excursion to Salineno the day before so I was off on my own to seach for this Texas lifer. At Boca Chica I found the beach as smooth as a highway so I was at the jetty in no time at all. The bird wasn’t sitting with a group of gulls like it was supposed to, so I put my scope up on the jetty and soon found my black-collared beauty feeding in the ship channel. It then flew to a nearby group of gulls and terns an allowed me to take a few pics.

I then turned my scope to the ocean and found a couple of Common Loons. Then an immature Northern Gannet flew by and then another dive-bombed into the sea. Bonaparte’s Gulls played in the surf at the end of the jetty. Then I caught sight of a dark, long-winged gull racing across the surface of the water…… JAEGER! He eventually gave me some great views, light phased bird, dark cap, big barrel-chested barred breast but being a land lubber I just don’t have the experience to make the call. I think it was a Pomarine Jaeger.

After some lunch, lovingly packed by my sweetie, I drove back down the beach to the mouth of the Rio Grande (Boca Chica), Sometimes good gulls like Lesser Black-backed and Glaucous can be seen on the other side of the Rio making for a good Mexican tick. No such luck this time, but I did find this sick Northern Gannet marooned on the beach. He probably wound up as coyote food but that’s part of nature too.

The Rio Grande Valley experienced it’s first snow since 1895 and it’s first white Christmas ever as one inch of the fluffy white stuff coated practically everything. Temperatures dipped as low as 28 F and spent at least 12 hours below the freezing mark. It looks like we’ve lost our papayas at our house but over all plants and animals seemed to have weathered the ordeal relatively well.

My wife, Honey, and I were able to find one male Crimson-collared Grosbeak and I was able to get a poor pic through my binocs. We aslo heard the Dusky-capped Flycatcher and saw Gray Hawk, Sharp-shinned Hawk, Clay-colored Robin, and Wilson’s, Yellow-rumped, Black-and-white, Black-throated Green and Oranged-crowned Warblers. We didn’t see a lot else and numbers seemed a bit down after the cold weather.

The Crimson-collared Grosbeak invasion continues with no end in site. This morning (12/22) I birded Frontera Audubon Thicket in Weslaco, Texas with hopes of photographing the Dusky-capped Flycatcher. I eventually found the bird and got a few shots but I don’t think they will be too good. While seaching for the flycatcher I constantly heard the high pitched “seeezzz” call of Crimson-collared Grosbeaks. Several brilliant males were seen zipping through the woods or perching on shrubs munching leaves. One birder later told me he had seen three males. That was new. Thus far we had only seen two males and three female/immature birds. Could the immatures be aquiring adult plumage? One birder said that one of the males was flitting its wings and acting like a young bird.

Meanwhile another birder had just arrived from the Williams residence in Pharr. She had seen three female/immature Crimson-cllared Grosbeaks along with a Rose-throated Becard all in her binocs at one time. Now there is also a pair at Sabal Palm Sactuary in Brownsville. Another one was found dead in Brownsville after flying into a window. And finally Selena King, the manager of Frontera saw a male in her yard which is at least a mile from the Thicket.

So let’s add them up. Thirteen Crimson-collared Grossbeaks have been seen in the Rio Grande Valley this fall. Before this year there had only been eight accepted records. The first was in 1977 and the last was 1988 (invasion of five single birds). There has been a few single observer sightings (not accepted by TOS) since then. Why the big invasion? Is it the result of a good wet summer in northern Tamaulipas after ten years of severe drought? Dose the mild fall season have something to do with it?. Lots of questions and the winter vagrant birding season is just starting. Stay tuned!

Other birds seen today and yesterday include Gray Hawk, Sharp-shinned Hawk, Green Kingfisher, Solitary and Spotted Sandpipers, Clay-colored and American Robins, Hermit Thrush, Tropical Parula, Ovenbird, Hooded, Black-throated Green, Black-and-white, Myrtle, Orange-crowned and Wilson’s Warblers, Blue-headed Vireo and Summer Tanager.

My wife and I walked over to the Frontera Audubon Thicket this morning in an attemp to add a few count week birds for the Weslaco CBC. Of course our first bird was one of the male Crimson-collared Grosbeaks. The Valley total for this mega-rarity is now an incredible nine individual birds. Next a pair of Summer Tanagers refused to let us go by without admiring them. The male even broke into a whisper song.

A bit farther down the trail I found a couple of kinglets and patiently tried to coax something else out of the woods. What I got came as a real surprise. A beautiful east Mexican form of Dusky-capped Flycatcher flew in about 20 meters away. The dark crown, light throat and petite (for a Myiarchus) bill ruled out the more expected Ash-throated or Brown-crested Flycatchers. I felt better when I got it to answer my whistled Dusky-cap “wheer” imitation. Bright rufous edging to the flight feathers, wing coverts and rectrices and light yellow underparts helped contribut to really sharp looking bird. The Dusky-caps that people commonly see in southeast Arizona are so drab compared to their more tropical cousins.

Other interesting birds for Frontera included flyover Gray Hawks (2), Long-billed Curlew and Osprey. Also seen were Yellow-throated, Black-throated Green, Myrtle, Orang-crowned, Hooded, and Wilson’s Warblers, Indigo Bunting, Hermit Thrush and Solitary Sandpiper. I had a good look at what I think was an immature Broad-winged Hawk. It was perched and I was not able to see it in flight. Birding was super and we added several neat birds for the CBC count week

Yesterday (12/18) my wife and I had the pleasure to cover the Llano Grande area south of Weslaco for the Weslaco Christmas Bird Count. This choice area includes part of the central valley flood channel, agricultural fields with irrigation ditches and some populated areas of Mercedes and extreme south Weslaco. Sunny, cool weather and lots of birds made the time pass quickly and by the time we were finished we had amassed a total of 101 species all by ourselves.

Birds includes Black-bellied Whistling Duck (6000), Roseate spoonbill (8), Long-billed Dowitchers (250), Stilt Sandpipers (80), Eurasian Collared Dove, Rufous/Allen’s Hummingbird, Vermillion Flycatcher, Sprague’s Pipit (6), Northern Waterthrush, Black-throated Green Warbler, Wilson’s Warbler and Yellow-headed Blackbird (10). Nothing super rare but a really fun day!

Last Sunday my wife Honey and I spent the morning scouting for the upcoming Weslaco Christmas Bird Count. I pestered Martin the compiler till he gave us the area south of town, north of the Military hwy. This includes the Llano Grande wetlands and the central floodway. So we spent a warm, windy morning fighting the dust as we drove along agricultural fields and levees. The water conditions were perfect with lots of mudflacts for the wintering White Pelicans, Double-crested and Neotropic Cormorants, Black-bellied Whistling Ducks (thousands), American Avocets, Black-necked Stilts, Stilt and Western Sandpipers and Long-billed Dowitchers. We even had a Roseate Spoonbill. Despite the great conditions and large numbers, diversity was a little low. We’re hoping more stuff blew in with the front this past week.

Land birds were a bit difficult to find with the strong wind. We heard lots of Common Yellowthroats and saw a Swamp Sparrow. Best birds were nine Sprague’s Pipits that flew up from the grass along the levees. Though she is a beginning birder, Honey recognized the unique flight pattern of the pipits thought I had not said anything about it. Several of them landed on the levee in front of us giving us great looks. There were also lots of American Pipits, Horned Larks, and Savannah Sparrows in the plowed fields. Looked like a great place for lonspurs.

Weather forecast looks great for this weekend so I’m itchin’ to get countin’. Then the next day we’re doing the dirt roads up on the Falcon Dam count. It’s going to be fun looking for desert stuff and sparrows.