Laredo

We read online that there would be good birding in Laredo. On the Mexican border, straddling the Rio Grande along with Nuevo Laredo, apparently the migratory flight patterns of many North American summer birds are right through here. Also, there are a number of resident birds that are different from those we had seen along the Gulf Coast. The big chatter was about the local White Collared Seedeater, but we got skunked on that one.

We spent both our days here looking for birds in the local city, county and state parks. We managed to find this Eurasian Collared Dove in Lake Casa Blanca State Park. That is another Lifer for us – yeah! The very crisp black collar on this guy is very distinctive. There were a ton of birds in the park, but nearly all of them we had seen several times before.

On our stroll with Kona in North Central park we spotted more birds we were familiar with. We heard chatter that a few years ago someone had spotted an Amazon Kingfisher, never before seen in Laredo. We spotted a Kingfisher in the park and held our breath. It turned out to be a Belted Kingfisher which we had seen in SPI, but it was still fun. The we spotted another Lifer – for real! This juvenile Northern Goshawk has a Southern range that just encompasses Laredo – not as far South as SPI. Bonus!

Talk to you soon!