Rio Grande Bird Photography

[mitch_mcconnell]

I will be taking a week in January to do some bird photography. I

would like to try someplace new, and the southern Rio Grande area

sounds great. I would appreciate any advice about the area,

accomodations, especially good sites, etc., that people are willing

to share. All kinds of information will be greatly appreciated!

 

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Thanks,

 

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mitch

[don_baccus]

Get yourself the ABA/Lane's "Birder's Guide To The Rio Grande", which covers Brownsville to Falcon Dam in far more detail than I, or anyone else here, can do in less than a 150 pages with maps, etc.

 

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If you don't have a good source for such books at home, Portland Audubon (hey, I'm on the board, my chapter comes first!) at (503)-292-WILD can sell you one mail-order. LA Audubon also has an incredibly extensive inventory of birding books, so if you're planning a future trip to Siberia or someplace like that check them out. They have a web page (so does Portland Audubon, come to think of it).

 

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Be sure to go to Aransas to check out the whooping crane before heading up the Rio Grande - I recommend Captain Ted if he's still running boats.

[mitch_mcconnell]

Don,

 

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I *do* have the ABA Guide you mentioned. Everything I have read

sounds like this is a great spot for birding, but since my photographic journeys have mostly been in Florida, I am trying to get

more photo-oriented information....

 

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Mitch

[don_baccus]

Oh, cool, a lot of folks don't seem to know about these guides...

 

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Anyway, Benson State Park is a good bet for photography, as all the snowbirds down there put out feeders. Make yourself friendly, and perhaps someone will let you shoot birds near their feeders - you can put up some natural perches for them.

 

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The Sabal Palm preserve in Brownsville (NAS owned) has feeders with a steady supply of green jay, and other birds.

 

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Santa Ana is great birding, and could be good for photography with luck. Same with the Falcon Dam area - ringed kingfisher, unfortunately, are just as skittish as their smaller, belted relatives.

 

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I've only been down there on one winter birding trip. The friend I went down with is an intense birder so I didn't bring my photo gear with me, doesn't seem right to make someone sit four hours watching me photograph green jays all morning! So, my info is limited but the above will perhaps be of help.

 

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Oh - unless you're really into Mexican crow, give the Brownsville Dump a miss...

[brad_carlson]

i second the "stop at aransas" advice. there you will find not only the whoopers but also roseate spoonbills. look for high concentrations of birds all the rest of the way down the coast - especially around rockport/fulton. texas is in the process of creating a "birding trek" along this route all the way to the valley and beyond. it will include free guides to the stoping areas, species to observe, migration times and so on. check the texas parks and wildlife web site for updated info.

[tim_cooper]

With over 45,000 acres of space, Laguna Atascosa NWR is a GREAT place for wildlife photography. A 15 mile tour loop offer many opertunitities from the vehicle. Trails are not heavily used so you can get away from the crowds at other Valley sites. In addition, the possibility of photographing the endangered aplomado falcon is a real possibility here.

[ellis_vener_photography]

I was in Brownsville recently for a commercial shoot last fall at the Gladys Porter Zoo. the guys who work at the zoo were terrific, they said that a lot of the migrating birds have discovered the zoo as a stop over oasis; good food, water, no hassles so you might want to check this place out. A great small zoo. The new macaw exhibit is especially worth checking out. The birds in this exhibit were donated to the zoo by the U.S. Customs Service after being seized from smugglers.

Salud!

[bob_royse]

This is an old thread, but my experiences might be useful to someone heading there in the future.

 

I just came back from a week of birding and photography in the Lower RioGrande Valley. The birding, of course was great with 50 lifers for me. The photography was as good as anywhere I've been also.

 

Along the coast, SPadre Island was excellent for photography, though crowded. Just north of the Convention Center was a terrific place for shorebirds. A mudflat attracts most of the wintering species as well as terns, gulls, herons and egrets. Morning light would probably offer more opportunities. I found Laguna Atascosa NWR to be a total waste of time when I was there. I hoped to find Botteri's Sparrows, but they weren't singing yet. It was too windy to see let alone photograph anything. Rules there prohibit you from walking down to the shore where a lot of cool birds were sitting in some nice light.

 

With limited time, I didn't check out the Brownsville area. 10 days to 2 weeks would have been better to cover the area between the coast and Falcon Dam as thoroughly as possible for birding and photography both.

 

Santa Ana NWR and Bentsen-RioGrande SP are great birding places and are good places to photograph with heavy use of flash on some species that can't be found elsewhwere (e.g. Green Jay and Plain Chachalaca).

 

For me the most productive area, and where I spent most of my time, was in the Falcon Dam area. The Falcon State Park gets little use on weekdays and many species are easily photographed in some nice open light. It's easy to create a water drip there by letting a faucet at a camping site leak a bit. The RV Park at Salineno was closed when I was there, but back roads in the area were productive (e.g. the Salineno Dump Rd., the road to Chapeno, and the roads by the San Margarita Ranch). Potential species to photograph in that area in late March include Vermilion, Ash-Throated, and Scissor-Tailed Flycatchers, Greater Roadrunners, Altamira Oriole, Black-Tailed Gnatcatcher, Cactus and Bewick's Wrens, Pyrrhuloxia, Verdin, 16(!) sparrow species including Cassin's and Black-Throated, Curve-Billed and Long-Tailed Thrashers, etc..... If staying in the in the nearby town of Zapeta, check out the roads to the public boat ramps for species like Cassin's Sparrow, Cactus Wren, and Loggerhead Shrike. Go ahead and give the White-Collared Seedeaters a crack with your camera at the Zapeta park, but wintering Lincoln's and Grasshopper Sparrows are more reasonable photo subjects.

 

I must say that having the new Canon 600/f4 IS lens made photography FAR EASIER than could have been possible with any other lens. I used it often with a 2x on a beanbag from the car and some of the sharpest slides I've ever taken are now in my collection.