Patagonia Lake Free Bird Walk

I led this week’s free bird walk at Patagonia Lake State Park, which was very productive. We tallied an impressive 63 species.

Out on the water we found GREEN-WINGED, BLUE-WINGED and CINNAMON TEAL, BUFFLEHEAD, COMMON MERGANSER, both NEOTROPIC and DOUBLE-CRESTED CORMORANT, and GREAT EGRET. Overhead were NORTHERN ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOW, and several early migrant TURKEY VULTURES.

The cottonwoods, willows, mesquites and hackberries around the lake provided GRAY FLYCATCHER, NORTHERN BEARDLESS-TYRANNULET, several VERMILION FLYCATCHERS including a female building a nest, HUTTON’S, PLUMBEOUS and CASSIN’S VIREOS, BRIDLED TITMOUSE, BLUE-GRAY GNATCATCHER, HERMIT THRUSH, BLACK-THROATED GRAY WARBLER, and a good selection of sparrows including RUFOUS-WINGED, LINCOLN’S and a brief SWAMP SPARROW in the cattails.

There were BROAD-BILLED HUMMINGBIRDS everywhere, and BLACK-CHINNED HUMMINGBIRD at the feeder, joined briefly by a stunning male RUFOUS HUMMINGBIRD and an equally attractive VIOLET-CROWNED HUMMINGBIRD.