Texas Day 12

We are based in Winnie for a total of 5 nights staying at the Days Inn.

For our Day 1 we visited a few agricultural areas  - short grass fields and the like before going to the Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge.

The meandering bayous of Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge cut through ancient flood plains, creating vast expanses of coastal marsh and prairie bordering Galveston Bay in southeast Texas. The marshes and prairies are host or home to an abundance of wildlife, from migratory birds, to alligators, to bobcats, and more.

Established in 1963, the 34,000-acre refuge is part of the National Wildlife Refuge System, a national network of lands and waters set aside for the benefit of wildlife and you.  The management focus of the refuge (and its companion refuges, McFaddin and Texas Point) is to protect and manage the coastal marsh for migrating, wintering and breeding waterfowl, shorebirds and waterbirds, and provide strategic and crucial nesting areas for the neotropical migratory songbirds migrating across the Gulf of Mexico.  

At the refuge, in between seeing a whole slew of birds we ran into Chris and Chris - Siddle and Charlesworth respectively. Both were deeply involved in an Avocet Tour. It was great to see them again although frustrating that we have not yet had much opportunity for a chat.

Chris C found us Swallow-tailed Kites and found King Rails for his group; a species that we [almost naturally] dipped on.

breeding Cliff Swallows

Rose breasted Grosbeak

Rose breasted Grosbeak

Orchard Oriole male

Boat tailed Grackle

walkways in Anahuac

Purple Gallinule

Least Bittern

Marsh Wren

Snake...

close up

After lunch we visited the famous High Island, visiting first Smith Oak Woods, run by the Houston Audubon group.   

We didn't get to the rookery there as we were almost instantly enchanted by the passerines. They came, for a while at least, pretty thick and fast; Carolina Wrens, LT Grackles, Tennessee and Prothonotary Warbler, Indigo Bunting, Scarlet and Summer Tanagers, Baltimore and Orchard Orioles, Eastern Kingbirds, Yellow-throated Vireos, Painted Bunting, White- throated Sparrows, Eastern Wood Pewee,  Common Grackles, Cardinals to name a few. Yellow bellied Sapsucker also appeared - another trip bird.

Eastern Wood Pewee - bad pic but Lifer!

Yellow bellied Sapsucker

Carolina Wren