Tag: Quinta Mazatlan

They Who Eat Snakes with Feet

After a seriously bumping landing in Vegas and a similar rough landing on the way back, I can now proclaim we had a successful birding trip in Sin City. During the course of outing, I am quite religious about copying all the contents of the digital card(s) to two separate portable drives at the end of each day. Recharge the battery(ies), format the card(s) and get ready for the next day. I am careful about only using one drive to do any quick validations and count tallies to insure one copy stays pristine. At the end of the trip, those two drives end up being uncomfortably close together, causing a high degree of worry until the contents of one of the drives is copied onto the highly redundant NAS drives and another copy on the work drives for later digital processing. Can you tell I’ve lived an Information Technology life – TRUST NO ELECTRONIC DEVICE MADE BY HUMAN HANDS ha. Everything safely copied – stress levels return to normal. I did get a chance to update this year’s Average Year stats (link here). Official count comes in at +26 for the Vegas trip with 9 new lifers bringing the current total to 237 with 14 lifers (Ron currently sits at 158 with 12 lifers). 35 birds ahead of last year’s pace – not too shabby only a few months into ’23.

Hope you all enjoyed Brad’s Yellowstone series – it definitely has Linda and I motivated to book a trip back out there. It is time for me to get back on the post horse and earn my keep. Ironically, with the prior notes about how well this year’s birding is going, I’ve decided to feature a bird that successfully eluded us this year.

Grey Hawk found at Quinta Mazatlan, McAllen, TX in January 2022

As you will see later in the post, the Grey Hawk (Technically Gray Hawk) has a very limited presence in the United States.  Not to be confused with the male Northern Harrier which is often referred to as the Grey Ghost (link here).  This Hawk one of the top When we head down to Texas each January, this is one of the targets at the top of the list.

Hit the jump to read more about this relatively rare visitor to our southern border.

Continue reading They Who Eat Snakes with Feet

Fuzzy Butters

Greetings everyone! Good news, we survived the storm that passed through Galveston Island last we chatted. I can only imagine how terrifying it must be to be in a trailer with a Tornado barreling down on you. We only reached 60mph gusts and that still put a rockin’ on our small RV. As promised, headed out to the beach to see what interesting things were brought ashore as soon as Mother Nature gave me the chance. Combed the beach and found some really nice (intact) shells, first giving them a nudge to make sure I wasn’t disturbing the sea version of a mobile home – beyond the blue jellyfish washed up everywhere (already gonners), no creatures were harmed.

The plan was to publish the latest from Brad’s queue while we started our trip back to the tundra. Checked the WordPress drafts and shock, it wasn’t there. Craptastic! Hoping it isn’t in the bit-bucket – will check on that when we stop for the night (worst case I have the original copy and can just paste it back into blocks). In the meantime, a perfect time to get a post out I promised B. (from across the pond) several months back. Now for the disclaimer – if you want to see incredible Butter pictures, go to his site (link here). My long-rig is not designed for these delicate looking creatures and my species knowledge would barely fill a thimble.

Butterfly found at Quinta Mazatlan in January 2022

When the birds are slim in the field, I start looking for other targets to keep me entertained – no Dragons, no furries, might as well give the arms a workout and target these rather spastic flappers. Hit the jump If you want to see some of my better clicks – again, Linda won’t let me take her macro in the field without some ridiculous amount of honey-do commitments, so soft shots it is ha!

Continue reading Fuzzy Butters

Definitely Not Another Squirrel

Bad news for those of you out there hoping for another post from the Squirrel family and good news for those that have been filling my inbox up with comments to the contrary. Truth is, I would have gone with another fur focused series if I had one in the queue. I’m only getting home maybe one or two days a week these days if I’m lucky. When I do, I’m more focused on getting the growing list of upkeep items like mowing taken care of over prepping images for the blog. As a result, I’ve been relying on drafts I worked up to use while we were down in Alabama. Thought it would be good to get back to the main staple here at Intrigued – BIRDS!

White-Eyed Vireo found at Quinta Mazaltan, McAllen TX in January 2021

Today’s feature is not a new bird to the blog as it was featured back in November 2018. (link here – but warning, don’t go there). There are few birds that frustrate me more in the field than these here White-Eyed Vireos. Year after year after year I’ve encountered specimens in our many outings and I’ve only managed to feature this vireo that one time back in ’18 and that was ONLY because I wanted to officially get the checkmark. Went with some crappy shots for that post which is why I warned you NOT to go there – if you went there anyway, you might want to go rinse your eyes out – no worries, I’ll wait until you get back.

White-Eyed Vireo found at Quinta Mazaltan, McAllen TX in January 2021

Hit the jump to learn why this bird was on my nemesis list.

Continue reading Definitely Not Another Squirrel

Not the Rumps Currently in the News

Greetings everyone! We are finally back home now having completed our intended mission on Exploration Tres. I am still absolutely shocked at the lack of connectivity we faced as we move further and further north. Guessing some of it has to do with our provider as we really only have one option that has sufficient coverage by our home here in the country and they tend to be weaker as we travel out of the state. The rest of the issue is Linda keeps dragging me into deep woods in remote parts of the country – if you don’t hear from me in a while and find out Linda is in Tahiti with the dogs…do me a favor and drop a line to 911 for me hehehehe. The birding was a bit hit or miss on the trip so the backlog queue didn’t grow that much. On the odd front, this is the first time since I can remember I didn’t tin one of these.

Immature Yellow-Rumped Warbler found at Quinta Mazaltan, McAllen TX in January 2021

The shots in this series failed to give you a view of their primary tell-tale characteristic, so you may not recognize tonight’s featured feathered friend. Imagine that yellow patch on the side of the breast to also be found on the rump – yep, this is the very ubiquitous Yellow-Rumped Warbler. Although the species can be found in the entirety of North America dependent on their seasonal regions, this happens to be my first immature – well, at least that I am willing to show you ha!

Immature Yellow-Rumped Warbler found at Quinta Mazaltan, McAllen TX in January 2021

Hit the jump to read a bit more on our delicately colored specimen.

Continue reading Not the Rumps Currently in the News

A Totem for Linda

Was on the fence about what to feature in my upcoming post. I happen to be in one of those rare times where I have plenty of options with images all processed up and ready to go. Then an interesting thing happened which tipped the scales in favor of this rather stoic looking Hawk.

Red-Shouldered Hawk found at Quinta Mazatlan, McAllen, TX in January 2021

I happen to really like the shot above and purposely let the barrel of The Beast out to give you the full view of the sight that caught my attention. Linda was the one who spotted this one while we were standing outside Quinta Mazaltan in McAllen, TX back in January. For someone who denies being a “birder” or as she puts it, one of “those people” she is certainly gaining an eye for our feathered friends. Linda can also identify a large swath of birds just from following me out into the field – another fact she will deny in public. Back to the image, the scene made me smile – from the Hawk’s perspective. “What ya’ feeling like for dinner honey? How about some Purple Martin. Yes, and I know just the place to get a carry out!” For the concerned, you can rest easily knowing no Purple Martins were hurt in the making of this post.

Red-Shouldered Hawk found at Quinta Mazatlan, McAllen, TX in January 2021

Hit the jump to find out what got me thinking about this Hawk – hint A SNAKE!

Continue reading A Totem for Linda

Happy Tears

Well, I finally beat a trail course today that has been putting a serious hurt on me since the day I discovered it. Even owned it being a bit tired from 3 hours of whacking weeds on the lot. Not sure what it is about this course.. wait, I do know – the 4 miles of what seems like continuous climb to start and the 2x repeats of 1 mile vertical climbs at the end have my legs and lungs begging for mercy. The 3 miles on top of the plateau of the big-ass hill aren’t so bad. Yep, basically the start and the end spent traversing the slopes that has been my nemesis – until today! Of course, now I’m wondering if I’ll ever be able to make it out of this chair tonight ha. Enough about personal struggles – let’s get to the reason you are here!

Pacific-Slope Flycatcher found at Quinta Mazatlan, McAllen, TX in January 2021

Before we go any further, please take a few steps away from your monitor.  Can you still read this text without squinting?  If so, please take a few more steps back and try again.  Please repeat until you reach that optimum distance for this particular post.  These shots would be better characterized with finger paints and hoping the extra distance will hide the less than stellar execution.

Pacific-Slope Flycatcher found at Quinta Mazatlan, McAllen, TX in January 2021

Warning, tears coming after the jump.

Continue reading Happy Tears