Sal del Rey, 5/20/07

Nothing exciting this morning at Sal del Rey unit of the Lower Rio Grande NWR. Best birds were a pair of Blue-gray Gnatcatchers acting territorial. This is pretty much the south end of their breeding range. Most of the shorebirds are gone. This Wilson's Phalarope was being photogenic.





There were about 40 White-rumped Sandpipers around.



It's hard to imaging how these birds can feed in water that is so saline. This is salt precipitate forming as the water in the lake evaporates.



There's usually something cool to see at Sal del Rey. This time I ran into a heard of 15-20 feral hogs near the cienega. These are the descendents of hogs originally brought over by the Spaniards.



And then there's everyone's favorite insect, low man on the totem pole, the humble tumble bug. This guy's got some fresh nilgai dung. Yum!



Here's a Greater Roadrunner.



Black-bellied Whistling-Duck 5
Mottled Duck 2
Blue-winged Teal 1
Northern Bobwhite 6
Eared Grebe 1
Turkey Vulture 3
Crested Caracara 1
Snowy Plover 10
Killdeer 2
Black-necked Stilt 1
White-rumped Sandpiper 40
Baird's Sandpiper 1
Wilson's Phalarope 20
Laughing Gull 3
Gull-billed Tern 2
Mourning Dove 10
Common Ground-Dove 10
Ladder-backed Woodpecker 1
Yellow-bellied Flycatcher 1
Alder Flycatcher 1
Least Flycatcher 1
Brown-crested Flycatcher 5
Western Kingbird 2
Scissor-tailed Flycatcher 3
Cliff Swallow 10
Barn Swallow 5
Verdin 2
Cactus Wren 2
Bewick's Wren 5
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher 2
Northern Mockingbird 5
Curve-billed Thrasher 2
Yellow Warbler 2
Cassin's Sparrow 1
Lark Sparrow 5
Northern Cardinal 1
Pyrrhuloxia 2
Blue Grosbeak 4
Painted Bunting 2
Red-winged Blackbird 10
Great-tailed Grackle 4
Bronzed Cowbird 10
House Sparrow 1