Before I tell you about the fun we had this weekend, I want to mention that I’m teaching two upcoming classes for Travis Audubon. The first is “Creating a Wildlife-Friendly Native Garden,” on October 13. This 3-hour class will take an in-depth look at wildlife gardening, from great native plants to design considerations to fun projects, and more. The next week, on October 20, I’m teaching a class geared toward kids: “Family Fun with Wildlife Gardening.” Designed for kids ages 4-11, along with their parents or grandparents, we’ll have fun taking a look at the different kinds of wildlife that you can attract to your backyard, understanding how native plants are connected to native wildlife, and making a gift for wildlife that every child can bring home to their own garden. Both classes have size limits, so please register soon and join us!
This weekend the boys and I drove down to Hazel Bazemore Park in Corpus Christi, where hundreds of thousands of hawks and other birds can be seen during peak migration times, especially in the fall. Though fall migration occurs over several weeks, at the end of September local birding groups hold the Corpus Christi Hawkwatch as a focused celebration. (note: above is a Harris’s Hawk)
The biggest numbers are usually of Broad-Winged Hawks, though we saw many other raptor species while we were there, including a Zone-tailed Hawk, White-tailed Hawks, and many Kites, Kestrels, and Peregrine Falcons. Due to the heavy rainstorms the day before, however, the numbers weren’t quite as high as might otherwise have been seen — merely thousands as opposed to hundreds of thousands in the overall count.
The photo above shows a typical kettle of Broad-winged Hawks, but I had to zoom in and crop out a lot of birds to show you something more than just dots in the sky. They swirl and soar as they catch thermals to help them move ahead on their journey.
Those watching with binoculars and scopes worked together to call out the birds they sighted. I was no help. I’m too much a novice at IDing hawks from a distance, but that’s one reason I wanted to go down to be with others who know their stuff. Of course, my boys had both of our binoculars, and all I had to work with was my zoom lens, but that’s okay, too.
Mine is not a massive zoom lens, mind you, so my hawk pictures are few. However, a stroll around the park let me snap some photos of other birds in the area. Above is a gorgeous Green Jay.
One reason Hazel Bazemore is such a top birding spot in the Corpus area is that it offers a variety of habitats to please many different bird species, including shorebirds, as well as birds that prefer denser vegetation.
These Ibises couldn’t make up their mind where they wanted to look for food and kept flying here and there and back again.
A Great Kiskadee is commonly seen in Corpus Christi, but it was a new bird for me and the boys. It has quite the personality.
This Wilson’s Warbler was tough to catch a glimpse of, and even tougher to get a picture of!
Of course, Corpus Christi birding in the fall wouldn’t be complete without lots and lots of Ruby-throated Hummingbirds.
Looking down instead of to the sky, more wildlife was busy at work, including termite trails, which were fascinating. My son was most impressed with this ant’s ability to carry a relatively huge berry across a relatively huge distance.
As part of the Hawkwatch celebration, a falconer brought some birds out for show and tell (this includes the Harris’s Hawk at the top of the post, though Harris’s Hawks are occasionally spotted at Hazelmore each fall). Above is a captive-bred Aplomado Falcon, rare to spot in the wild but can be found in southwest Texas, Mexico, and farther south.
A European Barn Owl bears quite the resemblance to our native variety but is a bit smaller.
Here’s an Eagle Owl, which bears a resemblance to our Great Horned Owl but is actually native to Eurasia. It’s also larger than a Great Horned Owl. Gorgeous, it is.
Sometimes you’ve just got to end with a silhouette. That’s a Couch’s Kingbird above, showing off its classic bird shape.
FYI, it’s not too late to go see hawks down in Corpus Christi — they’ll continuing migrating throughout October. We hope to return to Hawkwatch next year — it’s so nice to be surrounded by lots of birders who can confirm identification, especially when the hawks are so high in the sky. Fun, fun, fun!
P.S. Thanks to my father-in-law for joining us! We were our own little flock of birders this weekend.
I’ve long wanted a pathway that winds around the back of the backyard. But a path 66 yards long — 200 feet — was a daunting endeavor. I worried about effort and cost and time, and as such kept putting it off, but as it turns out, the new pathway was a relative breeze.
To build the pathway, I used materials I had on hand. It was a perfect use of the remaining cubic yards of single-grind mulch I bought late last spring. I also took some cedar posts I’d intended for a different project and lined them up end-to-end to form the pathway borders.
To prep, the boys and I did a little weeding in the pathway area, taking the time to transplant precious natives we wanted to keep, including Meadow Sedges and an Alamo Vine that had sprung up on their own.
The boys created little sedge gardens in areas formerly empty, and some earned names such as Sedge City and Sedge Metropolis.
As an added barrier to weeds, we made use of old brown cardboard boxes, one of the most useful materials ever for a sustainable garden. The boxes will break down easily over time, but they block light for a nice long time, and 3-4 inches of mulch on top is plenty to help keep weeds at bay.
Side note: I seem to be in the minority on this most of the time, but I consider scorpions to be garden friends. They play such an important role in the ecosystem — both as a very beneficial predator (keeping insect populations naturally in control) and as a food source for birds, lizards, and amphibians. I go so far these days as to gently escort any house visitor out to the backyard, but house scorpions are pretty rare these days given that they have a nice environment in the wildlife garden outside. Every once in a while, I see a scorpion under a rock while I’m gardening, but I just cover it back up and let it be. They are nocturnal, so I don’t usually run across them unless I’m turning over a rock, which I always try to lift carefully.
Somehow I think that is one lucky scorpion to have made it down to our garden…. Note: the above photo was taken earlier this year, at another location. Clearly I need to get a photo of one of our special backyard buddies!
I have Flame Acanthus in two colors — red and orange. Other native Texas plants I grow for hummingbirds include Turk’s Cap, Standing Cypress, Autumn Sage, Tropical Sage, Crossvine, Coral Honeysuckle, Red Yucca, Texas Lantana, Purple Coneflower, Yellow Bells/Esperanza, Texas Betony, Lindheimer’s Morning Glory, and more.
But I always have feeders out, even in the winter. For a variety of reasons a hummingbird might not be able to migrate as far as it is expected to, and having a feeder available when no blooms are present in winter just might save its life.
When selecting a hummingbird feeder, I look for three primary things — does it only show red (no white or yellow parts), is it made of plastic or glass, and is it easy to keep clean? I avoid feeders with white or yellow flowers because bees are attracted to these colors, and I avoid metal feeders because they can so easily rust, and the heavy iron can kill hummingbirds.
Cleaning feeders regularly is vital to hummingbirds’ health. I replace the sugar-water every 3 days, scrubbing out the feeders with a vinegar wash and small bottle brushes. If you don’t have a tiny brush for the little holes, try a pipe cleaner. Be sure to include any little nooks and crannies, hunting down and scrubbing any black growth. Don’t let your feeders get yucky!
How else can you help our little hummer friends? Keep your garden free of pesticides, for hummingbirds need insects and spiders for protein. They’ll eat aphids, fruit flies, midges, and even mosquitoes! They also love shallow running water and mists.
Of course, don’t be fooled if some other “hummingbirds” come to visit — this little Snowberry Clearwing Moth has well earned its nickname of Hummingbird Moth. It flies and hovers and zips about to feast on the nectar of daytime-blooming flowers. You might do a double-take, for it can look like a hummingbird if you catch just a glimpse.
Habitat Stewards are volunteers. We have fun giving back to the community — helping create or restore habitat, playing in the dirt to prep beds and plant, teaching kids and adults about wildlife and native plants, and more. It’s incredibly rewarding, and our birds and butterflies are most grateful!
If you are interested in becoming a Habitat Steward, 
Of course, I hate to create a post without a photo, so I’m sharing one of a turtle we rescued this morning. My teenage son was learning to drive at the time, so let me just say that it was ONE LUCKY TURTLE. Actually, technically at that point I was back in the driver’s seat, but a few minutes earlier it might have been a big splat on the road.
We kept to the driving plan, intending to reach South Dakota that very day, so we only paused now and again to take in the peaceful surroundings. We did stop briefly for lunch in Cody, Wyoming, and even ate at the Irma, the hotel and saloon made famous by Buffalo Bill. (As nice as that might sound, I’ll warn you that the food and service were quite a disappointment. At least the historic atmosphere was something to offer the boys.)
Custer State Park maintains a population of about 1,300 Bison.
This big male is wallowing in the dirt. While many bison will do this to when biting flies bother them or when they are molting, in rut season male bulls do this to both leave their scent and display their dominance.
For example, prairie dogs are the primary food source for the endangered black-footed ferret, once thought to be extinct after prairie dog populations greatly declined, a result of habitat loss, extreme control methods, and disease. Burrowing Owls and Mountain Plovers build their nests in prairie dog burrows. Additionally, prairie dogs’ burrowing and grazing habitats improve soil quality, nutrient cycling, plant and animal diversity, soil water retention, and other ecosystem processes. Plus, prairie dogs kiss each other in greeting, and that’s just too cute.
Yellowstone is home to some 10,000 hydrothermal features. Aside from hundreds of geysers, the national park also has hot springs, mudpots, and fumaroles, or steam vents. These first images show one of my favorite hot spots, so to speak — Grand Prismatic Spring.
However, I will say that my pants earned their very own Yellowstone patch.
We did have great luck to be near the Beehive geyser just as it was getting ready to erupt. First, the indicator vent let loose, prompting folks to gather around for the big event to come. Some of them pulled out rain ponchos, too — clearly they knew something….
A few minutes later, Beehive let loose in a thrilling display. Its powerful water column can reach heights up to 200 feet. Because it is close to the boardwalk, water droplets will sometimes drench the crowds in temporary rain, which fortunately is remarkably cool by the time it comes down. Again, we had luck — the wind shifted to our left just as Beehive erupted, soaking other visitors but not us and most importantly not our cameras. And by the way, I really do mean soaking for those other poor folks.
Another lucky moment for us was being on hand for the eruption of the grand geyser that is cleverly known as Grand Geyser. It also can reach 200 feet, and its display is as impressive as its name implies.
The walking trail takes you past numerous other hydrothermal features, some with impressive sinter formations. Siliceous sinter comes from deposits of silica dissolved by hot water passing through rock called rhyolite. Above, you can see a thin sinter crust around Heart Spring. The deep blue color of the hot spring indicates that this water is super hot, so hot that even Yellowstone’s heat-loving algae and bacteria can’t survive.
The West Thumb Geyser Basin, by the way, overlooks the large, blue Yellowstone Lake, and many hydrothermal features can be found right along the edge of the lake, as well as IN the lake.
Why do all these hydrothermal features exist at Yellowstone? Simply stated, Yellowstone is on top of a large volcano. This supervolcano erupted 2.1 million, 1.3 million, and 640,000 years ago, forming three overlapping calderas, or geographic depressions. The last major eruption formed the Yellowstone caldera that would one day become the bulk of park we know and love. The Yellowstone caldera sits on top a giant hotspot. Magma flows as close as 2-5 miles below the surface, releasing tremendous heat. Water from snow and rain fills the underground plumbing and gets heated, sometimes to super temperatures of 400 degrees Fahrenheit when pressurized. It is this heating of water, combined with many small earthquakes and other natural processes affecting underground channels, that give Yellowstone its dynamic, impressive, and quite numerous hydrothermal features. The above photo shows that some of these changes can occur in the most unexpected places.
Here, dissolved calcium carbonate from hot water rising through the limestone is deposited in the form of travertine.
But I found some of the prettiest artistry when I looked down for a closer look, where thermophiles and mineral deposits create tapestries of colors and shapes.
How do plants and wildlife thrive around all these intensely hot, alkaline or acidic, and ever-volatile features? Well, many birds like the young Killdeer above enjoy flies that feast upon thermophilic bacteria at the edge of hot springs. This Killdeer walks along brown thermophilic mats, which indicates the temperature is around 90-100 degrees Fahrenheit. Hot yes, but okay for a bird to walk along.
This American bison had us worried when we saw it laying down on Geyser Hill near Old Faithful, but it was still breathing — we checked (from afar). It turns out he’s an older Bison, and perhaps the warm geyser area made a good sleeping spot. He got up and wandered away after a few minutes. But quite often we would spot Bison scat and other droppings in hydrothermal areas. It’s important to recognize that there is still danger here — a Bison or Elk walking too close to the fragile crust near a geyser or hot spring could suffer a traumatic death.
Many plants thrive despite their warm-water surroundings. The Bison scat mentioned above actually has great effects on the landscape surrounding hydrothermal areas. The seed- and nutrient-rich droppings of Bison and Elk allow grasses to grow where once there was none.
But other plants succumb to the effects created by the presence of heat, silica, or pH. A change in hot water flow can suddenly kill off old-growth pines. Geysers spray silica-rich waters, which can flow around nearby pine trees. This will eventually kill the trees because they will effectively drink up this water, drawing silica into their roots and trunks, which will harden over time until the plants die. But where some plants no longer live, other areas will support new growth. Nature continues.
Even so, we redid this photo several times, because Logan’s head kept blocking out the Grand Teton (not that we were surprised). We finally got one showing Grand Teton, but then Nolan’s head got cut out of the picture. Alas.
Grand Teton National Park in summer still has many beautiful wildflowers, such as Indian Paintbrush.
