FOR THE BIRDS

Birding enthusiasts Nan Dietert and Lyndon Holcomb are reporting on local and area birding. To report a sighting, contact them at nandietert@yahoo.com. The giant foxtail grasses are still and straight now, only gently rustled by the wind. Most of the birds that bent them over and weighted them down are gone. The first of June is the beginning of the end of spring migration. It is a sad time for most birders. You’ve grown accustomed to the migration and it’s become a part of your life. They have been before your eyes for more than two months. They have brought you beauty, anticipation, discovery and joy.

I had a knot in my throat Tuesday, June 2, for it was the slowest morning so far. In an hour and 15 minutes, I saw only three species of migrants in the Joan and Scott Holt Paradise Pond. Monday, June 1, it was nine species, and one wonders what the count will be tomorrow. But, how can a person complain? The spring migration has been so remarkable.

For Paradise Pond, it started on March 15, after a cold, 1-inch rain, when the first groups of black-and-white warblers, the first northern parula, and the first Louisiana waterthrush were spotted arriving from their wintering grounds. After that, Paradise began to hop. Nearly every day you could add birds to your list. Now, looking back – approximately 112 species of migrants have been recorded in Paradise Pond. It’s a stopover point; in the spring they are moving toward their breeding grounds to our north.

But humans like to complain, and though I know to count my blessings, I am in withdrawal and I am whining. I feel empty, like you would if a good friend just left you and drove out of town. Of course, there are breeding birds to find, and a few little guys out in the marsh that I put aside for summer viewing; but my true addiction cannot be soothed until the fall migration starts, and thank goodness it is not that far away.

Some birds will begin to move off their breeding grounds in late July. I checked our records, and last year on July 24, we saw our first fall orchard oriole in Port Aransas. One day later we found our first piping and blackbellied plovers on the beach. Near the first of August, we saw a spotted sandpiper and heard upland sandpipers overhead. A few days after that, while birding Wilson’s Cut, we found marbled godwits and a least flycatcher. Then on Aug. 10, while driving northwest of Port Aransas, we saw our first of season Swainson’s hawks, Mississippi kites, upland and buff-breasted sandpipers and black terns.

At that point migrants began showing up in Paradise, with an olive-sided flycatcher, two yellow warblers, and a single yellow-bellied flycatcher recorded. By the second week of August, the gates of fall migration seemed to have opened up and large groups of piping plovers were found on our beaches and Paradise Pond now added yellow, Canada and yellow-throated warblers, eastern wood pewees, great crested flycatchers, eastern kingbirds, yellowthroated vireos and summer tanagers. By late August, the migration was in full swing. For the next three months, fall birds were seen arriving everywhere along our coast.

It’s been a catharsis to go through these records and list some of the birds that will be returning soon. Here on the Gulf of Mexico, we see the evidence of these remarkable migration journeys twice a year. It is a true inspiration to experience them. The very survival of each species depends on these massive migrations. Soon you will be able to witness the magic again. Wait for it, plan for it, bird it!