Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl

November 12th 

I've been guiding daily since November 10th for the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival. Just before noon on the 10th, a Social Flycatcher was found at UT-Rio Grande Valley in Brownsville. My trip returned to the Harlingen Convention Center around 12:30, I grabbed a quick lunch, and then headed down with another field trip leader, Willie. We arrived just after 1 pm, and the bird had not been seen since the initial report at 11:30. We scanned the area around the resacas - the Spanish term for an oxbow lake - and the surrounding neighborhood. More and more guides showed up after they'd dropped off their trip participants. Despite several dozen people scanning the areas, the bird did not turn up again, as we stayed until sundown. 

Today I guided at King Ranch, probably the most reliable place in the country to get Ferruginous Pygmy-Owl. After not many attempts at calling one in, one flitted through the thicker brush a few times. This particular owl turned out to be rather uncooperative, and we ended up leaving it alone before too many people got looks. We loaded the bus and drove another few miles down the road, where we stopped and tried for a different owl that Tom had scouted last week. This one appeared after several minutes, and ended up perching up high in a tree for a good amount of time, while we trained scopes on it and all the participants got great looks. 

We had 43 participants on this trip, and five guides. I didn't expect to be able to get a photo or video of this bird, as priority when guiding is to get participants on the birds, but this bird sat long enough that everyone had satisfying scope views and then I was able to take a quick twelve second video through my scope. 

Twenty birds remaining to secure the all time Lower 48 big year record!

Year List: 705