Misc Nature Observations on Our Walks

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I need to get caught up with some of the things we have been doing of late.  The biggest thing left is to mention some of the many interesting things we have seen over the past several months while taking our daily walks.  Rarely did it seem there was enough to blog about, but looking back now over several months we have enjoyed seeing quite a few different things.

Birds.  When we walk we almost always see birds of some type.  It is very unpredictable what we will or will not see.  The birds we see on any day vary drastically in both type and number.

Some of the variation is due to the fact that we are in the middle of the North American Central Flyway, the bird migration route that follows the Great Plains through the center of Canada and the U.S., then extends through Central America and into South America.

Some of the migrating birds are those we see during different times of the year at our backyard feeders, such as the black-eyed juncos.

Biological Flyways, Credit: Michael A Johnson, North Dakota Game and Fish,  https://flyways.us/flyways/info

However, many of the birds on the flyway are waterfowl or various types of raptors that prey on fish. Since most of the locations where we walk are on or very near Lewisville Lake, we are in the midst of a prime location for spotting large numbers of such birds.

It is common to encounter a great blue heron or two, some great egrets, coots (which are not ducks), and perhaps a few ducks (usually mallards, but also at least single sightings of bufflehead and blue-winged teal) almost anyplace near the water.

Solitary Great Blue Heron at Double Tree Ranch Park

Mallards at Unity Park, 3-2-17

However, during Christmas week we were shocked to stumble upon huge numbers of great egrets, cormorants, and ring-billed gulls.  None of the pictures truly shows the large numbers of birds, since they kept flying to the side of the pond away from us as we walked around the pond.

Great egrets at Double Tree Ranch Park, 12-22-16

Egrets, herons, and ducks at Double Tree Ranch Park, 12-22-16

There were so many egrets, they even began to takeover the sidewalk.

Great egrets at Double Tree Ranch Park, 12-22-16

The large numbers of birds were not only at Double Tree Ranch, but also on the lake itself.

Cormorants and ring-billed gulls along the Lewisville Lake Dam as seen from the cricket field at Lake Park, 12-27-16

We thought the egrets might be checking out some of the trees at Double Tree for nesting sites, but within a week or two they were mostly gone.  Many other birds, such as the cormorants, are still around in reasonably large numbers.  We are not sure what to expect as the seasons change.

Cormorants on the Trinity River from the Redbud Trail at LLELA, 3-3-17

The Army Corps of Engineers often lets sizable amounts of water out of Lewisville Lake  Apparently a large number of fish go along for the ride.  This attracts lots of fishermen to the river below the dam, both humans and birds.

The big one that didn't get away--Trinity River below Lewisville Lake dam

We did not get to LLELA early enough in the year to see the pelicans that we saw last January, but we did see large numbers of osprey over the river in February.  They would hover high above the water looking for fish.  Unfortunately the osprey now seem to be gone for the year as well.
 

Osprey hovering over the Trinity River looking for fish, 2-11-17

We have also seen an American kestrel, lots of vultures, and, MOST EXCITING OF ALL, a pair of bald eagles, YES-- IN NORTH TEXAS!!!  We saw them only briefly, but the Frog was able to get a picture of them on the side of the dam.  Unfortunately, it was from a very great distance.  By the time we got closer, they had already moved on. 

Bald eagles on Lewisville Lake Dam, 2-10-17

Other animals.  Other than Bun, our backyard cottontail rabbit, we have not seen many wild mammals.  (Bun is only marginally wild.)  We have seen deer a few times at LLELA, but only fleetingly as they ran away.  We never saw them long enough to get a picture.  We have also seen coyotes multiple times in multiple locations.  We used to see rabbits a lot, but those seem only to be in populated areas.

Although there are plenty of animals that frequent our backyard, we rarely see animals on our walks.  Despite not seeing them, we know they are around, at least at LLELA, since we have seen lots of tracks.  At various times we have seen tracks for raccoons, opossums, bobcats, and coyotes. 

Critter tracks, 2-18-17

One set of animals we would really like to see are the beavers.  We have seen plenty of evidence of them at LLELA. 

Trees cut by beavers near the viewing blind, 12-28-16

Beaver lodge and beaver dam along Bittern Marsh trail at LLELA, 2-12-17

This week, while watching for the beavers, we saw something move in the water near the beaver lodge.  However, it was not a beaver.  It was a 2-3 foot long snake, who froze in place for several minutes trying to figure out what we were.

A cottonmouth in the water along the Bittern Marsh Trail, 3-21-17.  Note his tongue.

According to the experts online, where I posted the pic, it is a northern cottonmouth water moccasin--yes, a venomous snake.  I am glad we were up on the boardwalk and he was down in the water. 

However, even a venomous snake was not the most unusual sighting of the day.  Through the trees we saw a birdhouse that looked rather strange.  With the binoculars we could see there were bees flying around the box that was nearly covered with a honeycomb.  The director of LLELA says the bees have taken over multiple birdhouses throughout the preserve.  Apparently the honey bees are doing very well here.

Beehive in a birdhouse on the Bittern Marsh Trail at LLELA, 3-21-17

It is safe to say that most of our daily walks would provide very little to blog about.  However, taken together over several months, we have seen many new and exciting things. It will be interesting to see how things change with the change of the seasons.