Tag: neighborhood trails

Neighborhood Small Year 2009

During the second week of January 2009, while walking along the trail that runs down to the little pond in our neighborhood, I decided to make it a point to come out at least once a week and count birds to try to get a sense of what birds are in the neighborhood, when they’re here and how many I could see.

I jokingly called it my Pond Trail Big Year, mainly because I didn’t expect to see all that many birds on our little stretch of trail. It turned out to be more of a medium or even small-sized year, but still worth every moment. Keeping counts and lists is cool, but for me it’s more of a memory tool since I’ve never been terribly competitive about such things.

I managed to keep my commitment to birding the trail at least once per week, expect for a week in May when we were in Missouri and a week in August when we were working at Camp Periwinkle. In all, I counted 61 species on the pond trail and if I also include the birds I saw at my house and the birds I saw on the regional trail (with which the pond trail connects) leading to the lake where Double-crested Cormorants, Ring-billed Gulls and Greater Roadrunners can be seen, the number jumps to 67 birds seen on foot, which is a decent number, I think, for someone still learning to find birds.

It wasn’t long before I started paying attention to more than just the birds. There are trees, wildflowers, rabbits, turtles, deer, butterflies, snakes, and frogs out there. I started to try to pay more attention to those things as well, and it wasn’t long before I went beyond just birding to a different kind of seeing that seemed more a witnessing the little patch of nature just beyond my yard.

Some of my most memorable days include the day after one of our hailstorms when I saw an Osprey and a Black-and-white Warbler on the same day; the day I discovered the Blotched Water Snakes that live under the bridge; or the time I watched a Yellow-crowned Night Heron catch and kill a crawfish (which made me realize that being boiled alive is probably the easy way out for a crawfish compared to the hard way administered by the night heron).

There were times, particularly during last summer’s especially brutal drought-ridden days of infernal heat, on which I had to force myself to get out, knowing I would see only grackles and vultures, but even that was fun since I really do like those birds quite a bit.

I learned a lot about the seasonal migration patterns of my local birds. Things like when the different duck species come and go from the pond, which ones just pass through and which ones stay. I learned where to look for different kinds of birds and what to listen for and how to let my ears guide my eyes when trying to find something.

In addition to learning a lot about birding, I realized some things about the kind of birder I am. I rarely drive to go birding and when I do, it’s usually just to go somewhere else in Austin like Hornsby Bend. There’s something immensely satisfying about walking out one’s door and seeing the birds that live nearby. Considering the toll taken on all wildlife by cars and roads, birding by foot just seems a bit greener, and getting to know an area inspires a deeper understanding of a place that goes beyond the superficial. I think I’d rather know every bird in my neighborhood than see every bird in the state (which isn’t to say I don’t try to see as many birds as I can; rather, I’m just not going to kill myself—or anything else—to do it).

Other people joined me on these walks: my wife (quite frequently), my parents, my father-in-law, various houseguests. It was fun to be able to share some of the discoveries I’ve made, and those were some of my favorite walks.

Here’s the final 2009 Neighborhood Small Year list with stars next to the ones that were life birds:

Black-bellied Whistling-Duck *
Gadwall
American Wigeon *
Blue-winged Teal *
Northern Shoveler
Northern Pintail *
Ring-necked Duck *
Pied-billed Grebe *
Double-crested Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Little Blue Heron
Green Heron
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron
Black Vulture
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
Accipiter sp. *
Red-shouldered Hawk
American Coot
Killdeer
Ring-billed Gull
White-winged Dove
Mourning Dove
Greater Roadrunner
Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Black-chinned Hummingbird
Belted Kingfisher *
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Ladder-backed Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Eastern Phoebe
Ash-throated Flycatcher *
Western Kingbird
Scissor-tailed Flycatcher
Blue Jay
American Crow
Purple Martin
Barn Swallow
swallow sp.
Carolina Chickadee
Black-crested Titmouse
Carolina Wren
Bewick’s Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Eastern Bluebird
American Robin
Northern Mockingbird
European Starling
Cedar Waxwing
Orange-crowned Warbler *
Yellow-rumped Warbler *
Black-and-white Warbler *
Common Yellowthroat *
Chipping Sparrow
Song Sparrow *
Northern Cardinal
Red-winged Blackbird
Common Grackle
Great-tailed Grackle
Brown-headed Cowbird *
Baltimore Oriole *
House Finch
Lesser Goldfinch *
American Goldfinch
House Sparrow

I’m looking forward to my next walk. I’ll probably keep walking the trail weekly since I did that anyway, but if I don’t feel like it, I won’t. It will also be nice to enjoy walking without listing and counting, though I’ll still list occasionally and continue posting those numbers to ebird for whatever scientific value it may serve.

This was a good exercise for me, but I’m glad to be able to just get back to walking and enjoying the birds, which is what it’s supposed to be about anyway.

Update: This post was included in I and the Bird #118 at Ben Cruchan – Natural History.

More Trees & Winter Trail

January 12, 2010 • James Brush • 2 Comments

I noticed this tree the other day while I was walking along the neighborhood trail looking for birds. As to birds, I mostly saw the usual suspects, though I did see Cedar Waxwings, which was the first time I’ve seen them in the neighborhood. The Ring-necked Ducks finally returned as well, but this time, I tried to see the trees and spend some time with them.

It was cold here last week, the coldest it’s been since 1976 according to the paper, and so I set out to see if things looked different in that brittle winter light we see so rarely here.

It’s been dry so no snow or freezing precipitation, but I did see some ice along the muddy edge of the stream. I doubt I would have seen it if I hadn’t first heard my boots crunching through it. Nothing too impressive as far as ice cover goes, but ice outside of a drinking glass is a novelty around here.

This is the view looking up the stream (southwest). I still can’t get over the damage last summer’s hailstorm did. Most of the trees that lost their fight with the sky that night have been cleared away, but I like that this one was left over the creek like a little bridge for night-scurrying animals.

I wonder if a small tornado came through this part of the trail since so many trees were felled. If you draw a line from this spot to our house and a few blocks beyond, most of the roofs along that line had to be replaced (including ours). I guess the trees didn’t stand much of a chance.

I’ll write about the birds and my big medium small year that concluded with this icy walk in the next few days.

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Just for grins, I recoded my site so that the sidebar loads after the posts, a thing which needed doing for quite some time. It’s nothing a reader would likely notice except that the site might load faster now, but what prompted me to do it is this nice enhanced gallery feature in WordPress 2.9. Here’s a gallery of pictures from my walk. Clicking on them will display them at a higher resolution on their own image pages.

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In non, tree, bird or WordPress news, I was happy to see that my prose/poetry piece “The Man Who Spoke the Law” (originally published at qarrtsiluni back in October) was included on Adam Ford’s January 2010 Poetry Mixtape. Check it out. He says nice things about “The Man Who Spoke the Law” and there are links to some really terrific poems on the same mixtape.

Treetops & Winter Sky

January 11, 2010 • James Brush • Leave a comment

Last week, I took a walk along the pond trail. I was looking for birds, but it was the trees that really captured my attention, bare and still against the coldest days we’ve had here since 1976. It wasn’t cold like it can get up north, but it was cold enough to make me wish I still owned a pair of gloves.

Birding the Neighborhood Trail

December 4, 2009 • James Brush • 6 Comments

They said it would snow today. The blizzard of aught-nine was on its way. There were some flurries around lunchtime, enough to enjoy the feeling of being snowed upon, but soon the temperature dropped and the sun came out to create the kind of brilliant and crisp day we so rarely see here. A great day for hiking while wearing a coat, another novelty of sorts.

I followed the north-running stream through the neighborhood greenbelt, stopping on the little footbridge to try to ID a bird call I wasn’t familiar with. Soon, I saw the bird, which turned out to be a Belted Kingfisher. It’s only the second time I’ve seen one and the first time on this little stretch of trail.

I stood on the bridge, kind of losing track of time and letting it flow along with the water below me, content to be outside and cold and remembering those fierce days we had last summer on which cold and water seemed such impossibilies.

After coming back to reality, I took a few pictures of the play of colors on the water and tried to figure out where that kingfisher had got to. I knew which tree he was in, but from where I stood, he was too well hidden, but I was treated to the surprise of a Great Egret hanging out in a nearby tree. These guys are pretty common around here, but they’re usually a little farther downstream at the pond rather than around the bridge.

I spent a little more time looking around for the kingfisher since they’re relatively new birds for me and I’ve never gotten a picture of one, but it was not to be. I continued along the trail to the pond where I counted 51 Gadwalls dabbling and quacking around in circles. I’m sure there were more as I could see the silhouettes of a number of ducks in the glare on the pond, but I couldn’t tell what they were. Among the Gadwalls, I saw three American Wigeons. It’s nice to see the ducks are filtering back for the winter.

Speaking of coming back for the winter, the other day I saw an accipiter (most likely a Sharp-shinned Hawk) like the one that lurked around my yard last winter make a pass over the bird feeder. I wonder if it’s the same one.

In addition to the ducks, I saw Yellow-rumped Warblers and, I think, a Ruby-crowned Kinglet, but he flew off before I could be sure.

It wasn’t long before the cold seeped through my coat and my hat and heading home seemed like a good idea, though I wanted to stick around and look for that Red-shouldered Hawk who’s been refusing to let me get a good picture of him all year. Maybe next time.

Birding the Pond Trail, First Week of Autumn

September 28, 2009 • James Brush • 2 Comments

Last week, the first day of autumn brought a cold front and rain so it actually felt like fall for a few days. I took a walk down the trail that runs through our neighborhood and was surprised to see that some of the winter residents had started to come back. I didn’t bring my camera since it was raining so no pictures.

I wasn’t expecting to see anything more than the grackles, vultures, jays and doves that I’ve been seeing all summer on these weekly counts down the trail so I was happily surprised by the tapping of woodpeckers. Ladder-backs and Red-bellies are fairly common in the neighborhood during fall and winter, but other than a Downy I saw back in July I hadn’t seen one or heard a woodpecker since early April, but I saw at least 2 Ladder-backs and I think I heard a few more farther down. Welcome back, woodpeckers.

As I approached the pond, I saw one of the Red-shouldered Hawks swoop out over the trail. He had some unfortunate something in his talons. Based on size and color, I suspect it was a dove. I saw him again a little farther along. This time he was sitting in a branch about 30 feet off the trail. He stuck around long enough for me to get a quick look and wish I’d brought the camera since it had stopped raining. This hawk has been teasing me all year and one of these days, I’m going to get a decent picture.

When I got to the pond, I was surprised to see a few ducks. I counted 3 Blue-winged Teal in the reeds on the far side. A few days later, I spotted 6 of them, so the ducks are starting to filter back in from points north. I also spotted 3 Pied-billed Grebes swimming in tight formation a little closer to my side of the pond. I can’t help but wonder if these are the same 3 that spent last winter here. These are the first grebes on the pond since May and the first ducks since early April. Welcome back, waterfowl.

For those who may have forgotten (or for any newcomers), I started a so-called Big Year (really more of a committed small year) back in January to see what birds I could see along the trail within a mile of my house. Here’s the updated list as of last week, the first week of fall:

Black-bellied Whistling Duck
Gadwall
American Wigeon
Blue-winged Teal
Northern Shoveler
Northern Pintail
Ring-necked Duck
Pied-billed Grebe
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Little Blue Heron
Green Heron
Yellow-crowned Night Heron
Black Vulture
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
Red-shouldered Hawk
Killdeer
White-winged Dove
Mourning Dove
Black-chinned Hummingbird
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Ladder-backed Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Eastern Phoebe
Ash-throated Flycatcher
Western Kingbird
Scissor-tailed Flycathcer
Blue Jay
American Crow
Purple Martin
Barn Swallow
Carolina Chickadee
Black-crested Titmouse
Carolina Wren
Bewick’s Wren
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
Eastern Bluebird
American Robin
Northern Mockingbird
European Starling
Orange-crowned Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
Chipping Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Northern Cardinal
Red-winged Blackbird
Common Grackle
Great-tailed Grackle
House Finch
Lesser Goldfinch
American Goldfinch
House Sparrow

Scenes from a Short Hike along the Neighborhood Trail

September 8, 2009 • James Brush • 12 Comments

The other day, I took a short walk down the neighborhood trail, pointing the camera down more than up. It was a gray and humid day that suggested rain but none ever really fell in our neighborhood. Even if it had, the drought would still be way ahead.

I really like this little bridge that connects two neighborhoods with the main trail. I’ve gotten a few nice shots looking downstream from it and sometimes I even see a few snakes hanging out nearby.

I probably should learn to ID some of the wildflowers around here. Until I do, though, they’re just going to have to be pretty white flowers. Whatever they are, they jumped out of the surrounding dry green like sparks.

There used to be a really nice log like this farther down the trail, but it’s gone now. Probably in someone’s house or on their porch. I hope this one goes unnoticed a little longer.

As dry as it’s been, you’d think the cacti would be loving it, but the prickly pears are suffering as much as everyone else. I saw more dried up and dead ones than usual.

A further reminder to learn the names of some flowers.

Somewhere in the archives of the City of Austin, there is probably a notation that could point some bureaucrat straight to this tree. I think the trees with numbers are the good ones.

I keep seeing this single bone in a clearing and finally took a picture of it. A mile farther down, I found a deer skeleton last spring. I wonder if this is part of the same.

There weren’t many birds out other than the Turkey Vultures, which I enjoy watching as they sail overhead.

Snakes on a Blog

August 17, 2009 • James Brush • 2 Comments

Lately, I’ve been trying to pay more attention to the other life that lives along the little stream that runs to the pond down the street. Summer birding in these parts can be a bit dull and besides, there is a whole ecosystem out there to enjoy and appreciate.

From the footbridge over the stream, I’ve been noticing these little snakes that like to sit in the water, likely waiting for minnows to swim by. I’ve seen as many as three at a time going in and out of the crevices in the rocks. A jogger stopped on the bridge to have a look and he told me he saw four of them a few days prior.

As a kid living in the Philippines, I learned never to mess with snakes, and I still don’t even though I know the poisonous Texas snakes and these aren’t them. According to Austin Reptile Service’s ID Page for blotched snakes, I’m pretty certain these are Blotched Water Snakes (nerodia erythrogaster transversa), a nonvenomous species. The one with the more pronounced pattern is a juvenile.

Despite the fact that they’re nonvenomous, I kept my distance and certainly wouldn’t pick one up and not just because I don’t think people should go around handling wild animals but because, well, those Philippine lessons die hard and it could be a cobra or a bamboo viper. Aren’t irrationalities fascinating?

Still, I enjoyed watching them cool in the water and on that 100+ degree morning, I wouldn’t have minded joining them.

The Stream after the Storm

June 26, 2009 • James Brush • 2 Comments

One of my favorite places in the neighborhood is the little stream that runs north along the trail and feeds the pond. It’s about 1/8th of a mile from the house, but it’s a lovely little shaded place to sit and watch or listen to birds. There’s a little wooden footbridge over the stream, which is where I took this picture late last summer.

About 2 weeks ago a monster hail storm rolled through our neighborhood. No tornadoes, but the center was rotating when it went over the bridge on its way to our house where it broke a window and ruined the roof. It also took a bunch of trees. The picture below is the same view, standing on the bridge. Despite the fact that I shot it with a much wider lens than the one above, the trees over the water make it seem tighter.

The stream still flows beneath all that and the grackles at least could be heard bathing and nuk-nuking under the fallen tree.

For another view, here’s one I shot last winter. I used the same lens — all the way wide — for both of these shots. There isn’t much shade left there now.

From the footbridge on the trail in winter

Along the Pond Trail and a Bird List

June 19, 2009 • James Brush • Leave a comment

I took a walk along the trail down to the pond today. It was only about 95°F outside, so I counted it a cool day. Still, I figured I’d see what birds were out, do my weekly count for my Pond Trail Big Year and have a look at what the hailstorm did last week. I forgot to charge my camera battery, so no pictures.

The storm ripped up and beat down most of the undergrowth so walking off the trail was easier, though it was weird with all the leaves that shouldn’t have fallen until autumn on the ground instead of still in the trees. Several trees had fallen across the little creek near the footbridge so it was a lot more open in an area where I’m used to deep shade this time of year.

The reeds near the pond were decimated, and I didn’t see any Red-winged Blackbirds around. That’s where they had been nesting so I wonder if they’ll be back. The herons were away as well so I wonder if their nests got flooded or destroyed in the storm. This was this first time all year that I didn’t see any kind of water bird around the pond.

As to birds, I saw the usual suspects for this time of year: grackles, Blue Jays, mockingbirds, cardinals. In the non-avian category, I saw a rabbit and some kind of a garter snake. Nothing special to add to the bird list, but here’s the updated list for the pond trail, about halfway through 2009: