Birds, birds, birds

I almost forgot this photo - until I realized I didn't want the cemetery shot to lead. This is a story about feathered creatures.

DH and I decided to start the new year with a bang and participate in one more Christmas Bird Count. Everyone talks about Granger Lake and what a great spot it is for birding so we signed up for the count at Granger Lake.

But where the last count started with a couple of emails and 4 questions, this one started with 4 pages of directions and coordination and 11 pages of detailed maps and notes. I spent 3 hours reprinting the maps so I could read them better as well as typing up the notes and deciphering the shorthand for bird names.* I have no idea how many hours I've spent looking up birds we expect to see and listening to their calls/barks/chirps/songs.

This afternoon we grabbed our gear and headed about 35 miles south where we will spend our waking hours on Monday. We consulted the maps and traversed the northern boundary of "Area 4." These roads are the craziest group of country roads I have ever seen. At home the roads are a sensible grid for the most part. But these twist and turn - sometimes turning back on themselves. After a 90 degree curve or two, the road number might change or not. Thank heavens for the maps! I'm usually good with directions, but even with the sun out and watching, I kept getting turned around as we traveled this  "confusion of roads."

Granger has what appears to be a cemetery at the edge of town. It is actually a group of cemeteries.** We drove into the City Cemetery and immediately found a bird, but not the kind we were seeking.

The Bird family plot***

Then we found three black vultures behind the cemetery. They gently circled the field just beyond what appears to be a drainage ditch, but could easily be the remnants of a creek. [We did hear a few birds hiding in the trees in the cemetery, but they never showed themselves even as we played an owl call or two.]

We left the cemetery and turned right down another county road that took us past a couple of grain elevators/bins. Fields on either side had been planted (winter wheat?) and the fields were full of blackbirds. What kind of bird were they? Well, I did see a couple of sparrows among the blackbirds. I am calling "Vesper Sparrow." The blackbirds? I think grackles, starlings, cowbirds, Red-winged Blackbirds and probably others. [I'll admit it, I was overwhelmed.]

The former music student in me wants to play this.

I've blown the photo up and tried to identify the individual birds.  I'll see who shows up on Monday.

I won't guess, but I can say there are over 100 birds in this photo so that means there were well over 200 birds just along this road.

 

We drove to where the road would take a turn to the left and saw it - another bird.

Yes, we were seeing birds on East Old County Road. I don't think we saw "New County Road."

We turned around once again and continued down a country road that provides one partial boundary of our count area. After winding around a bit we found the park where we will search the trails and check along the shoreline.  [24 Field Sparrows flushed out of the grass along the road as we exited the park.]

Our goal for the trip today was to time our drive and become familiar with the meet-up point. This spot is marked by a gate with cattle guard where yet another paved county road becomes a poorly paved and dirt track into the wildlife management area. We will begin our count here and search for Short-eared Owls in the hours before dawn (if the threatened rain doesn't ruin our plans).

As we arrived at the gate we noticed another vehicle (a pickup truck) was stopped on the cattle guard. His vehicle was in reverse (we could tell by the backup lights), but he was stationary. Before we could even question the behavior of the driver, our attention was diverted by movement down the dirt road where we observed  a large herd of White-tailed deer crossing from one pasture to the next. Amazed, I held my breath as I counted more than 15 deer.

After the deer cleared the fences we do-si-doed with the pickup, driving into the wildlife area to the turn-around and then back to the gate. The herd was gone, but there were birds along the roadway - perched in the trees lining the road.

We decided we were comfortable with our scouting and preparation for the bird count challenge. We will be searching numerous creeks, plowed fields, short grassy areas, wooded tracts, and a large shoreline. I cannot say we are ready, but we are about as ready as we are going to be.

I've already spent hours studying owls, blackbirds, sparrows, and woodpeckers. The blackbirds are calling me back. Then there are all the raptors, the wrens, the longspurs and more. We will be relying on the experts who lead our team, but we will test ourselves as well.

As we returned home and drove through our familiar neighborhoods we passed Birdwell Street. We are taking it as a good omen.


NOTES:

* Don't judge me - The key was simple - first two letters of the bird's first name and the first two letters of the bird's second name. [So, an Inca Dove was a INDO and a Mountain Plover was a MOPL.]

** I wonder why we cannot get along even in death. But some of these cemeteries were the result of the building of the dam. Cemeteries that would eventually be flooded were moved to this location (Beard, Machu and Allison "Old Friendship" Cemeteries). In addition to these and the Granger City Cemetery, the Brethren Cemetery and the Holy Cross Cemetery are located at the corner of County Roads 361 and 348.

***Robert Addison and Eliza Estelle Mitchell Bird. Robert was born in Tennessee in 1876 and died in Williamson County in 1959 (aged 83, heart attack). Eliza was born in Alabama in 1876 and died in Williamson County in 1947 (aged 71, cancer). They married in Williamson County in 1896 and were farmers in Granger, Texas. And they had children - Robert W, Irene, (Willie may be Robert W.), Milstid, and Edwin Lee. I wonder what happened to them all.