Laguna Atascosa NWR

 The Laguna Atascosa is a refuge that is located along the Gulf coast in south east Texas. It is the largest refuge in the south Texas Rio Grande Valley with around 97,000 acres. The refuge is bordered on the east by the waters of the Laguna Madre which flow out into the Gulf of Mexico. This area was primarily coastal prairie habitat until Spanish settlers came in the 1700's and converted much of the land to grazing land for livestock. In the mid 1800's Texas became a part of the United States and portions of the land were developed for agriculture. During WWII the U.S. War Department acquired portions of what is now the refuge and used it as an aerial gun and bombing range. Some of the bunkers still exist with in the refuge.

 In 1941 the US Fish and Wildlife Service proposed protecting the area because of the large number of waterfowl that wintered in the area, particularly the redhead duck. In March of 1946 the refuge was established by Congress. It has been designated as a "globally important bird area" by the American Bird Conservancy. It is an important migratory stop for numerous species of birds. There have been 417 species of birds recorded in the refuge which is more then any other refuge into the United States. A number of endangered species can also be found in the refuge including ocelots, jaguarundi, Kemp's ridley sea turtle and the Aplomado falcons, which were reintroduced by The Peregrine Fund in the 1980's,

Minnesota State Butterfly

 In 1998 Minnesota chose the monarch to represent it as the state butterfly. Although monarchs are very common to Minnesota and very beautiful I am not sure that it is the best choice to represent Minnesota and its population.First off as a larva, or caterpillar, the monarch eats only milkweed. The monarch above is perched on butterfly weed which is a type of milkweed plant. The liquids inside the milkweed are toxic to many creatures so as the monarch caterpillar eats the milkweed it too becomes toxic. This is a great defense mechanism to keep predators away but as a representative of Minnesota what does it say about the state. Second the monarch is one of the few butterflies that migrate south for the winter. While we do have a population of snowbirds here in Minnesota most of us can not afford to spend the winter on the southern California coast or in the mountains of central Mexico, like the monarchs do. Most of us have to stick around Minnesota during the winter and do our best to survive. There are several species of butterflies, like the mourning cloak or eastern comma, that over winter in Minnesota as an adult butterfly. Perhaps they might have been a better choice but I am sure that the legislators that chose the monarch as the state butterfly did not put as much thought into it as I am. 

Belted Kingfisher

 The belted kingfisher is a bird that can be found through out North America at different times. During the summer belted kingfishers nest on breading territories in Canada and the northern United States. They nest in burrows which the dig in dirt banks. Most the times these are river or stream banks but areas like roadside ditches and gravel pits have allowed them to expand their breeding range. The burrow is usually 3 to 6 feet long and slopes up to help keep water out. The belted kingfisher spends it winters in the southern coastal areas of the United States, Mexico, and Central America but they are often seen in the central portion of the United States during migration.

Basking

Humans are an endothermic species. This means that we produce our own body heat through the metabolic process. Mammals and birds are endothermic. Fish, reptiles, amphibians, and most invertebrates are ectothermic species. They get their body heat from an external means. The painted turtle is a good example of and ectothermic species. To be active the painted turtle must maintain its internal body temperature from about 65 to 75 degrees. So in the morning the turtle will need to sun for several hours after spending the night in the cold water. Once it warms up enough it can go out and forage for food, however it will have to return to basking frequently through out the day.  

Boca Sunrise

 Since we are pretty far from an ocean here in Minnesota we often stay in hotels that are close to the ocean when possible when we travel. In Florida we stayed on Sanibel Island, along the Gulf of Mexico, for half of the time and near Boca Raton along the Atlantic Ocean for the rest. This was the view from our balcony on Friday morning as the sun began to rise.

The Day After

 

This morning, after a lot of rich old white guys spent billions of dollars, Barack Obama is once again our future president. I am very happy with the election results. Here in Minnesota two bad amendments to our state constitution were defeated as well as a good number of Tea Party whakos. Since the environment is very important to me I support candidates that are pro environment and Tea Party people are not on that list. I think that this picture of Phoenix is the perfect picture to post on a morning like this. Congratulations President Obama and congratulations USA.

Taiga's TRC calendar Photo

Question Mark

The question mark butterfly is a true brushfoot butterfly. They are a part of the Genus Polygonia which is more commonly called the comma or punctuation mark butterflies. That is because each species of the Polygonia Genus has a conspicuous white or silver mark on the underside of the hind wing that resembles a punctuation mark. The mark on the question mark butterfly is broken into two parts, an arc and a dot, which makes it appear like a question mark. Question marks are found through out the eastern United States and into northeastern Canada. They usually feed on things such as dung, rotten fruit, tree sap and carrion but will drink nectar, as in the photo above, if their usual foods are not available. They are usually seen from late May to September but may be seen earlier or later in some of the warmer portions of their range.

TRC 2013 Calendar

This year I have worked to put together a calendar for The Raptor Center, as I have for the past few years. The calendar features many of our education birds, such as Whisper who was the featured bird for October 2013. The calendar also has pictures of birds being exercised with our flight crews, and birds being released back to the wild. I also intersperse the calendar with some of my wild raptor photos so that people can see some of the birds in their natural habitat. We also add a lot of information about the birds as well as the different species of raptors. The calendar is a bit more expensive then the cheap calendars that you can find at stores but all the proceeds go to help The Raptor Center treat and rehabilitate between 600 to 800 raptors each year. If you are interested you can purchase a calendar online here. 

Welcome to Tuesday Tweets! To join in the fun just post a photo of a bird and then link it by here by using the handy dandy link below. Then make sure you visit other sites to do a little bird watching.

Bahia Grande Restoration Project

 The Bahia Grande is part of the Laguna Atascosa NWR in south Texas. Located between Brownsville and Port Isabel the Bahia Grande was once a 20,000 acre coastal wetland ecosystem. Up until the early 1900s this ecosystem supported a variety of wildlife including fish, crustaceans, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and insects. In 1872 a railroad line was built to connect Brownsville and Port Isabel. This was the start of the death of the Bahia Grande. In 1936 a shipping channel to Brownsville was constructed which further restricted the tidal flow into the Bahia Grande. In 1951 State Highway 48 was built which completely isolated the Bahia Grande from the Laguna Madre. With no tidal flow the water began to evaporate turning this wonderful wetland ecosystem into a barren dust bowl. The Bahia Grande no longer supported much life and winds whipping across spread clay dust into the neighboring towns.

In 1999 the US fish and Wildlife Service acquired almost 22,000 acres of land in and around the Bahia Grande and began a project to restore the land back into the wetland habitat that it used to be. A series of channels have been dug to flood the area and provide it access to a consistent tidal flow. The main channel is 225 feet wide, 2400 feet long, and 9 feet deep. It stretches to the Brownsville Shipping Channel to provide tidal access to the Laguna Madre and Gulf waters. Several smaller channels have also been dug to assist in the restoration including a channel in the northern portion designed to catch freshwater run off to help with problems with too much salt. Even though they have been at it for almost 12 years this project is far from over. It usually takes much longer to fix nature then it does for man to destroy it. However progress has been made. Wildlife has begun to return to the area. As we drove through we saw brown and white pelican, shorebirds, oystercatchers, gulls (like the laughing gull in the first pic), osprey, herons, and egrets (like the reddish egret above). Since these birds were feeding hat means that there is also probably fish and other water creatures present also.

Julia

We just returned from a trip to Florida yesterday. Hopefully that the posts that I set up for while I was gone did not disappoint. With a few changes to our itinerary we were able to miss most of the weather from the hurricane and the only weather that we had to deal with was several windy days. We were a little early for many of the wintering birds that are migrating down but Michelle has family plans around the holidays and we needed to use some vacation or lose it so we made the best of it. Fortunately there were some fun birds and lots of new species of butterflies, dragonflies, and spiders. This is a Julia butterfly. The Julia is a tropical brushfoot butterfly that is usually found from Brazil to southern Florida and south Texas, although sometimes during the summer they will expand north. They typically fly most of the day and can usually be found year round through out much of their range. I took this pic at Loxahatchee NWR.

Darner

One of our newest education birds at The Raptor Center is this young female American kestrel. At TRC we try not to think of the birds in human terms, but since we have over 30 education birds we do name them so that we can keep them straight. Often when we get a new bird we let the community suggest names. This helps to get people more interested in raptors and The Raptor Center. Sometimes, though, the volunteers get to make the suggestions as a reward for all of the time that we donate. In the case of this female kestrel it was up to the volunteers to make the suggestions and I am very proud to say that the name that I suggested was chosen. Let me introduce you to Darner the female American kestrel. We try to name them something that we can use as a teachable moment when we are talking to people during programs or tours. American kestrel primarily eat large insects like grasshoppers, moths, butterflies and dragonflies. During migration they primarily eat common green darner dragonflies that migrate south at the same time. This is the reasoning for Darner's new name.  

The Blackpoll a Migration Specialist

The blackpoll is a new world wood warbler. They nest up on their breeding grounds in Canada and Alaska. When winter approaches they head south, like most warblers, where there are more bugs to eat. Unlike most other warblers though, the black poll does not head down through Mexico and Central America. Instead they fly from the southeastern United States across the Atlantic Ocean down into northern South America. During migration they may stop to feed on islands in the Caribbean but the average flight will pass over 1800 miles of water. This may necessitate a possible nonstop flight of almost 90 hours. In order to have the energy to make the long grueling flight blackpolls will bulk up to almost twice their size before they begin migration.

Clouds Over Yellowstone Lake

As the clouds rolled in over the hills in Yellowstone their twins spread out across the lake below.

Autumn Sky

I took this photo last fall at Crex Meadows as the sandhill cranes where flying in to roost in the pools for the night. I think that it is a great picture for Halloween. Not only is it orange but it also has that kind of eerie Alfred Hitchcock feel.