#5mr

Went on a 5MR Birding Trip yesterday and the Theme was: FLYING

Dat Bass

Love you too, Ring-billed Gull

Cormorants are hard to ID, because my area has both Double-crested and Neotropical, and they look similar from a distance. But when they fly, the Double-crested fly with the crook in their neck. Thanks!

I can’t believe any of these shots of the Great Blue Heron came out! I scared him away as I was approaching the second pond (I couldn’t see him over the edge), and I only had time to snap a couple. What did I see at the second pond?

The Grand Ole Osprey eating that giant fish! This was an hour after I saw the Fishing Incident.

Funny story: I’ve been to this park several times, but I’ve always been SO DISTRACTED by the pond at the parking lot, that I’ve never actually made it over to the other side of the park. So I had no idea there was A SECOND POND. That’s where the Osprey had taken this fish. The park is full of great birds, but it’s just down the road from the most popular birding spot in Austin, so basically nobody goes there. The Osprey’s dinner table was right next to the trail. I was getting kew-kew-kew-ed at so I had to turn back to prove I was not about to steal that fish. I didn’t even MAKE it to the wetland area beyond the second pond!

This park is my new pet project, I guess.

I was out looking for birds today and came face-to-face with an Osprey. Got my 5MR bird count up to at least 55, need to figure out all the weird ducks I saw (some of them look like a species I saw in Africa), but tentatively, I’m almost to 60!