Texas Locations
Favorite locations to meet birds in Texas.
2024
Memories of Bahia Grande – Texas
The road from Brownsville to Port Isabel and South Padre Island (TX-48) crosses a low, flat plane called Bahia Grande. I traveled this road many times during my stay in…
Memories of Marathon Texas
My first Texas Birding expedition began in 2020, with an ill-planned visit to Big Bend. I learned that because of Spring Break, all camping spaces in the park were occupied,…
Memories of Kickapoo Caverns State Park
In October-2022, I spent two nights at Fort Clark in Brackettville Texas. It was my base camp during my tour of Kickapoo Caverns State Park, about 30 miles away. In…
Memories of the Davis Mountains
Davis Mountains State Park has its origins in the 1930s as a Civilian Conservation Corps (or CCC) project to help lift the broken economy out of the depression. The CCC…
2021
Memories of Rockport Texas
My adventures in Rockport preceded my first expedition to South Texas, and the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic that would dominate our society one week later. On 2020-03-16, I drove…
Memories of San Bernard NWR
On Tuesday, 2021-03-09, I spent the night at a rest stop on the Interstate-10 freeway east of Houston. I endured a lot of drive time exiting Louisiana after I decided…
Memories of Anahuac NWR
After departing High Island in early March 2021, I set a course for the nearby Anahuac National Wildlife Reserve. I planned a quick visit before heading east on my clock-wise…
Memories of Port Aransas
I visited the Leonabelle Turnbull Birding Center next to the Port Aransas Nature Preserve on the last day of February 2021. I learned there was a popular boardwalk over the…
Memories of High Island
For my second expedition to Texas in 2021, I stayed five and a half months (2020-12-27 to 2021-05-13). I started in Guadalupe Mountains National Park, and Big Bend before gravitating…
Memories of Aransas NWR
Located 50 miles north of Corpus Christi (Texas), and primarily on the Blackjack Peninsula, rests the primary unit of the 115,324-acre Aransas National Wildlife Refuge. The barrier provided by Matagorda…
Memories of Big Bend National Park
I’ll begin by listing a few factoids about this popular national park. At 1,252 square miles, it is the 15th largest national park. The rugged terrain reaches heights of 7832’…
Memories of Guadalupe Mountains National Park
During the last days of the calendar (2020) I was leaving New Mexico, determined to revisit Texas. After spending Christmas day at Bitter Lake NWR near Roswell (New Mexico), I…
Memories of the Laguna Vista Nature Trail
Nestled at the southwest corner of Laguna Madre, that body of water that lies between the barrier island of South Padre in south Texas and the terra firma of the…
Memories of Boca Chica Beach
Perhaps one of the most overlooked birding “hot-spots” in South Texas is the mouth of the Rio Grande at Boca Chica Beach. There is no infrastructure or visitor center located…
Memories of Edinburg Scenic Wetlands
Centered in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, Edinburg is McAllen’s nearest neighbor to the east. It is where the Edinburg Scenic Wetlands are located. In March 2003, they opened this…
Memories of Quinta Mazatlan World Birding Center
Built around a 1930s 10,000 square foot mansion, Quinta Mazatlan is an urban oasis, with trails weaving through 15 acres of birding habitat in the middle of the city of…
Memories of Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park
Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park occupies 797-acres, with over 1,200 acres of adjoining U.S. Fish and Wildlife refuge tracts. In 1944, the Bentsen family donated 586.9 acres to the Texas…
Memories Of Santa Ana NWR
Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge nestles in 2,088 acres along the Rio Grande. With 14 miles of trails, there are almost limitless opportunities to meet birds and other wildlife. During…
Memories of The Sabal Palm Sanctuary
A few short miles south of Brownsville (Texas), is a birding destination of world renown. In the 1890s and early 1900s, it was one of the largest post-Civil War plantations…
Memories Of The National Butterfly Center
In February 2021, Texas experienced some freakishly cold weather. We called it the “Big Freeze”. Electrical power failed for four days, and temperatures fell to 15°F and stayed low for…
Memories of Estero Llano Grande
South Texas is about as close to heaven for bird lovers as any place I’ve ever visited. The southmost part of the state is fondly called the Lower Rio Grande…
2020
Memories of South Padre Island
Of all my experiences in South Texas, no other destination produced as many great birding memories as did South Padre Island. There are three must-see locations on the island. Just…
Memories of Breeze Lake Texas
My first birding expedition into Texas was in the spring of 2020. After being on the road since February 21st, on Monday, March 23rd, the world-wide panic from the pandemic…
Memories of Resaca de la Palma State Park
A week before the end of April 2020 I made plans to exit Texas at the end of the month. Then I learned of several locations I’d hoped to explore,…
Memories of Laguna Atascosa NWR, Texas
My first visit to Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge was on April 20th, 2020 after I left Corpus Christi and headed for the southern tip of Texas. The full impact…
Memories of Palmito Hill Texas
Near the lowest end of the Rio Grande, less than ten miles from where the river empties into the Gulf of Mexico, is the wide plain called Palmito Hill. Covered…