Early February stuff

I started out February with a trip to the National Butterfly Center.  The wintering Painted Bunting was easy to find.  I wonder if the green bird from last winter is this same male.

The wintering Western Tanager has not been easy to find.  It took me about four hours to finally encounter it by the water feature behind the visitor's center.  

Honey and I made a run over to Willacy County on Saturday.  A flock of about 400 Snow Geese made the trip worthwhile.

Searching through the flock I came up with a couple of Ross's Geese.

As we approached Port Mansfield, I glimpsed a brown sparrow-like bird sitting on the wire of a gated entrance to a ranch.  I made a quick u-turn and found my sparrow to be a Lark Bunting.  My first for Willacy County, #279.

We checked the coastal areas of Port Mansfield but not too much was going on.  Best bird was this Bonaparte's Gull in the boat basin.

This gull was troublesome for me.  I guess it's just a Herring Gull.  I caught a brief look at the primaries while it was in flight and they seemed to have the requisite pale patch but I would like better looks at it.

Back home we got our first Purple Martin of the spring.

And a female Yellow-bellied Sapsucker passed through the yard yesterday.  We didn't even get one last year for the yard list.