The Deskbound Birder: Texas and Yellowstone National Park - Background and Trinity River Audobon Centre 11th December (Day 1 and 2)

Wednesday 11 December 2019

Texas and Yellowstone National Park - Background and Trinity River Audobon Centre 11th December (Day 1 and 2)

Background
Having sold my business to a Dallas based consultancy back in May of 2019 I was required to attend a two day conference in Dallas on 12th and 13th December. I had decided to extend my stay in the USA by visiting a few birding sites around the Corpus Christi 'Coastal Bend' area for a small number of ticks and to visit Yellowstone National Park, a location that I had long wanted to undertake a winter visit to. Sarah and Tobias were to join me and so this was not going to be a full-on birding trip and so birding was combined with family events.

Logistics
To maximise my potential for seeing the few new birds available I employed local guides in Corpus Christi and at Yellowstone National Park. In the Corpus Christi area I used Jon McIntyre of McIntyre Birding Tours. In Yellowstone the new birds were even fewer but I wanted to use a guide to maximise our chances of seeing some of the mammals, targetting the few birds and allowing me to enjoy the scenery rather than drive and so we employed the services of Steve Hoffman of Merlin Birding and Nature Tours. Both guides were excellent, knew the sites well and knew where to locate the birds I wanted to see.

Weather
The weather in Dallas was generally cold at around 8c and overcast with some sunnier spells. In Corpus Christi the temperature went up to 26c, on our first day it was sunny and still and on the second day it was overcast and breezy. In Yellowstone National Park there was up to 75cm of snow on the ground wih temperatures down to -8c during the day. It was generally still and sunny with short spells of cloud cover.

Equipment
I took with me my Olympus kit with the OMD EM1x camera, 300 F4 lens and 1.4 converter. While I took my 2x converter I did not use this. I took bins and no scope as our guides had scopes.

Itinerary

10th December (Day 1) – Fly London Heathrow to Dallas (15:45 - 20:10).
11th December (Day 2) – Trinity River Audobon Centre AM.
12th & 13th December (Day 3-4) - Work conference with no birding.
14th December (Day 5) - Birding Corpus Christi area.
15th December (Day 6) - Birding Corpus Christi area.
16th December (Day 7) - Fly Corpus Christi to Dallas (scheduled flight cancelled) then Dallas to Denver then Denver to Bozeman landing at 20:40, 7.5 hours later than scheduled.
17th December (Day 8)- Travel east through Lamma Valley in Yellowstone National Park.
18th December (Day 9)- Travel west through Lamma Valley in Yellowstone National Park.
19th December (Day 10) - Non-birding day.
20th December (Day 11) Flight from Boseman - Denver (10:43-12:29) then international flight to London Heathrow (17:25-09:30) landing on 21st.

11th December
We were up at 07:00 and after breakfast took at taxi to the Trinity River Audubon Centre arriving at 08:45. We wandered through the woodland at the back of the centre recording Hermit Thrush, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, Eastern Phoebe, Downy Woodpecker, Hermit Thrush, Blue Jay, Northern Cardinal and my first tick of the trip, Carolina Chickadee. The reserve centre opened at 09:00 and we entered the reserve walking a short loop through the scrub habitat mainly looking for Harris’s Sparrow. The birding was fairly good and we recorded a range of species including Pileated Woodpecker, Red-bellied Woodpecker, White-throated Sparrow, White-crowned Sparrow, Eastern Bluebird, Northern Mockingbird, Song Sparrow, Lincoln’s Sparrow and Sharp-shinned Hawk. As we neared the small lookout I came across a flock of sparrows and eventually Sarah picked out two cracking adult Harris’s Sparrow. Eventually we considered that there were two adults and three first winters in the group. We headed back to the centre happy with the morning. Our taxi was due to collect us at 12:30 and I spent sometime birding around the car park while we waited realising that where we had seen the Harris’s Sparrow backed onto the car park. Beside the bus park I played a recording of Harris’s Sparrow and a cracking male and a female hoped up on top of a bush and sang in response, the song is a high mournful double whistle changing in tone between each series of whistles. I had great views of these birds and was very happy with such good views of my main target at this site. My eBird checklist can be viewed here.

We spent the rest of the day at the Dallas World Aquarium and the 12th and 13th were taken with a work conference in Dallas. On 13th we caught at 16:30 flight to Corpus Christi arriving at 18:15 and transferring to the Omni Corpus Christi Hotel.