A week in the Corpus Christi area: chasing seabirds offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, then back on land to knock out a few more counties for the Texas Century Club.
Lake Corpus Christi State Park was my home base.
Toured with Texas Pelagics on the Gulf Eagle out of Port Aransas. Pushed out of the dock at 6:00 am on a 14 hour excursion.
We traveled about 60 nautical miles out to the edge of the continental shelf drop-off, to a water depth of over 1000 ft.
Thirty miles offshore, we spotted something I’d never seen: four wading birds of four different species — a Snowy Egret, Great Egret, Little Blue Heron, and Western Cattle-Egret — migrating together. [Snowy Egret at top left, Great Egret top right, Little Blue Heron center, Western Cattle-Egret bottom]
Masked Booby, plunge diving for fish.
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One of my ongoing projects is the Texas Century Club challenge — 100 bird species in 100 Texas counties. While in the Corpus area, I visited several counties on my list, and in Refugio County I finally crossed the century mark, making it my 21st completed county. I picked up new birds in a few neighboring counties along the way. Here is some of what I found.
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the texas challenge sounds fun. how many lifers did you see and how’s your texas challenge list coming?