Choke Canyon

NOTE, on Mother's Day, I drove over to Mustang Island to check on the rare Falcon. On that day, she was still there, and there was a lot of movement in the nesting platform!!

This week, Bud and I took a leisurely drive up north of Corpus about 70 miles from home. About halfway between here and San Antonio Texas. We ended up passing the Federal Prison located in Three Rivers, Texas and stopping to do a little birding at Choke Canyon Reservoir. This reservoir is where our city gets its tap water...the lake has a capacity of more than 695,000 acre feet (857,000,000 m3). And it's now at the point of 100% full. In fact, they've been opening the dam now and then to drain and keep it from breaking and flooding disasters. Anyway, Choke Canyon is a HUGE state park and known nation wide as a birding hotspot. Of course, the big attraction is the water, boating, and fishing. Also, camping and picnicking. There is a hunting lottery to the drawn winners to keep wildlife from over-populating. I, of course, go for the birds.  We stayed but a few hours, the drizzling rain kept us from really enjoying our outing, and being that the water was bank-full, the birds were scarce, except for in the campgrounds.  Last time we were there, we could walk along the reservoir shores and had bird caches in the reeds because of the drought at THAT time.  But, a few birds we saw.  Here are the photos:

COMMON GROUND DOVE
habitat map:  Dove


KILLDEER

Killdeer get their name from the shrill, wailing kill-deer call they give so often. Eighteenth-century naturalists also noticed how noisy Killdeer are, giving them names such as the Chattering Plover and the Noisy Plover.

habitat map:  Killdeer


LONG BILLED THRASHER
habitat map:  Thrasher


TURKEY VULTURE
habitat map:  Vulture


RED WINGED BLACKBIRD
habitat map:  Blackbird


SNOWY EGRET
habitat map:  Egret



HARRIS's HAWK [two]
habitat map:  Hawk


CRESTED CARACARA [THE MALE IS GROOMING HIS MATE]
habitat map:  Caracara

On the nature trail, I saw but was unable to photograph:

Green Jay - 1
White Winged Dove - 5
Mockingbird - 5
Carolina Wren - 2
Turkey Vulture - 1
Tufted Titmouse - 2
and at the water's edge at the end of the trail:
Crested Cormorants - 4
Snowy Egret - 2
Great Egret - 6
Barn Swallow - x
Golden Fronted Woodpecker [heard only]

As we were leaving the park, we saw one female bobwihte quail on the roadside.


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