Are You Experienced? Part 2

To the posse,

I hope the storm that I hear is battering California right now doesn't result in the house being flooded. Good luck staying dry!

We had a nice day birding today, picking up 4 new birds for the year. Normally, that would be great progress, but compared to the other day at Estero Llano, it feels slow!

For today's installment, I thought I would continue the many-parted explanation of what birding is like, based on our experience yesterday looking for the Sprague's Pipit, a secretive bird of the grassy fields:

Field Birding Experienced

We pulled over to the side of the road, staring in disbelief. To our left, a 30-acre field of ankle-high grass, in which was hidden a small bird. In front of us, a mass of troops: 3 Border Patrol trailers containing 8 ATVs, 6 Border Patrol SUVs, 3 local sheriff's patrol cars, and 5 Texas Highway Patrol cars, and at least 2 officers per vehicle. Plus, 3 Border Patrol boats in the water and a helicopter circling over the forest nearby.

"Are we supposed to be here?" I asked.

"Well, it is a county park," she said, "and the cops are chatting and laughing. There were no signs telling us to stay away, and none of the other people in the park seem worried. It must just be a staging area."

"Um, all right, then how do we find this bird?"

"Well, the guidebook says the Sprague's Pipit hides in the grass, so we can't see it, and it doesn't call unless it's flushed. So we need to walk through the field until we scare it up. It is supposed to make a specific call, fly around, and then dive to the ground. If that happens, we have our target."

So, we started trudging. And trudging. And trudging. Down one side, back again, down another side, then diagonally across the field. Then, a noise! A small brown bird peeped, flew up in the air about 50', did a wide circle around us, then did a nearly vertical dive to the ground several feet away.

We looked at each other. "I guess that was our bird? That's all we get?"

"Yep," she said. And we trudged back to the car. 

Doesn't birding sound fun? Are you experienced? Do you want to be experienced?

OK, tomorrow we check out Laguna Atascosa NWR, and the sun is supposed to shine for the first time all week, so it should be a good day!

Lates,
Me

p.s. South Texas drivers seriously have to be the worst in the country. There seems to be a belief that turning left is a divine-granted right; we've seen half a dozen people turn left across 3 lanes of oncoming traffic, forcing oncoming traffic to slow or stop. Also, apparently "speed limits" are actually treated as maximum speeds, because we frequently encounter people going 35-45mph in a 55mph zone. On a busy, two-lane road. Arg.