[leasbirds] Re: White River Lake and Crosby Co. 3/12/14
- From: Anthony Hewetson <terrverts@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "leasbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <leasbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 12 Mar 2014 14:55:09 -0700 (PDT)
Greetings Cameron:
To be fair, it was a much better place back when it was a lake.
Anthony
________________________________
From: Cameron Carver <c.o.carver@xxxxxxxxx>
To: "leasbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <leasbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>; TexBirds
<texbirds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, March 12, 2014 4:20 PM
Subject: [leasbirds] White River Lake and Crosby Co. 3/12/14
Greetings,
I spent the morning birding White River Lake. I am not much of a fan of this
lake. Others speak highly of it, but I have never had great luck. Today was no
different, but birds were seen.
On the way out, I stopped by a pond because I saw it had water. It had some
Northern Shoveler, Mallards and 2 yellowleg sp. Turns out I have never seen
shoveler in Crosby Co.
A few Mountain Bluebirds near the escarpment. Three turkeys strutting around
near the bluebirds.
I thought the WRL was going to be good when I got out of my truck. An Eastern
Phoebe was calling and sallying out right next to the office. The person in the
office told me they had pelicans. Went out back and saw 9 American White
Pelicans in the middle of the lake. They must have flown off at some point as
they weren't on the lake later in the day.
At a resident's feeder there were 3 Pine Siskins, a handful of White-crowned
Sparrows and a couple of Dark-eyed Junco.
The lake is incredibly low. In trying to get a good vantage point, I
essentially drove all the way to the far northeast end of the lake. There is an
overlook at this point. It overlooks the receding lake; great mudflats. I spent
25 minutes scanning this area: 17 Greater Yellowlegs, 1 Lesser Yellowlegs, 14
Long-billed Dowitchers, 22 Killdeer and at least 35 Chestnut-collared Longspur
(there may have been a few McCown's coming in to the water, but I never could
verify that). I was hoping for some other shorebirds, but no luck. This
location will be extraordinary for shorebirds if conditions continue.
I walked the north woods for a while and had nothing.
At the dam there were 12 Common Merganser, 1 Hooded Merganser and 1 female
Red-breasted Merganser.
I spent a lot of time with the ravens in the area. I only saw one that looked
like it could possibly be turned into a Common and even then I didn't feel
confident that it was one. All others were the much more common Chihuahuan.
Reports of Common are on the uptick in this area, but photographic proof (or
specimens or any sort of hard evidence) is seemingly non-existent.
On the way back home I stopped by a spot with a little bit of water and some
trees. Big flock of American Robin and few Cedar Waxwing. One Spotted Towhee
calling was a bit exciting. Only Golden-fronted Woodpecker of the day was found
here.
Don't worry, bird happy.
Cameron Carver
Lubbock, TX
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