Gung-ho birding

The weather has been unseasonably warm, so I've been taking advantage of it. Birding as much as I can. Went to Candelaria with Judy Sims and had a great time. The best bird we saw was an American Golden-Plover, but we didn't know we'd seen one until processing our photos days later. It was so far away that my grainy photo didn't tell me anything. I submitted it as a Least Sandpiper, which was the best I could come up with.

The ebird reviewer told me it was a plover. At that point, I figured it had to be an American Golden-Plover. So I contacted Judy and asked her to look at her photos for the bird. She takes way more than I do, plus has a state-of-the-art mirrorless camera. She sent me what she had of it and we could see it was an American. So the fun of our trip was spread out over days.

We also stopped off at La Plata and got a Winter Wren. It wouldn't sit still at all for decent photos. Mine are horrible, but here's one of Judy's better ones.

Neither bird was a new Presidio County bird for me, but I did pick up four new county birds (Black Vulture, Northern Pintail, Sandhill Crane, and Redhead). I probably saw those species there before I started ebird, but I didn't have any documentation. My Presidio Co. list is now at 176, compared to my Brewster Co. list of 349. Anything worth doing is worth doing to excess, I've been told. LOL

Plotting my next birding venture. Some birders visited the oasis today and surprisingly saw a male Lucifer. I didn't see anything but Anna's when I went down a few days ago to service feeders. These birders also saw bear scat, so I'm hoping no damage. I'll check in a few days, I guess.