Winter 82/83 saw a potential crossroads in life and in an attempt to either clear my head or make a choice I decided that a last minute birding trip might help!! And so I found myself with 5 or 6 others on a trip to Texas, out of Heathow and in to Dallas and Houston, with a now defunct company called Wingspan. Sadly, it wasn't possible to take advantage of the airlines offer of £200-250 to travel on a later flight due to overbooking; if I'd been travelling solo I would have bitten their hand off!!
Eventually we arrived at Houston where we were met by Jon Dunn who was to prove a great leader, birder and all round nice guy; he was still actively working on the first edition National Geographic guide and we even got to see some proof plates brought along to evening log calls in the LRGV hotels by other members of the team.
We visited the southern pine woods, the coast at Galveston and travelled south down the coast, through the King Ranch and on to the Lower Rio Grande Valley and then returned back the same way notching up 259 species on the way.
The oddest birding was on the now defunct 'rail crusher' buggy at Anuhuac which sadly failed to get us Black Rail but then again maybe they'd all been flattened under the giant wheels of the buggy on previous evenings!!
A few highlight species with numbers in bird/days
Sadly, being pre digital and with no long lenses, photography was just a few site photos only.
Altamira Oriole 4
American Golden Plover 550
American Kestrel 60
Baird's Sandpiper 47
Black Skimmer 1,000
Broad-winged Hawk 460
Cactus Wren 1
Cedar Waxwing 1,100
Chihuahuan Raven 26
Chimney Swift 1,300
Clay-coloured Thrush 2 plus nest
Eastern Meadowlark 700
Ferruginous Hawk 1
Franklin's Gull 23
Greater Prairie Chicken 6
Greater Roadrunner 3
Great-tailed Grackle 15,000
Green Kingfisher 1
Northern Harrier 39
Hooded Oriole 2
Thayer's Gull 1
Lark Bunting 8
Least Sandpiper 400
Loggerhead Shrike
Pauraque 12
Plain Chachalaca 60
Red-billed Pigeon 3
Scaled Quail
Scissor-tailed Flycatcher 196
Sora Rail 1
Tamaulipas Crow 50
Upland Sandpiper 100
Whooping Crane 22
Wilson's Phalarope 267
Yellow Rail 2
