A birder's paradise, thousands of waders along the strandline and just offshore the beach at Bolivar Flats and all so close that you can enjoy fantastic views in the great light.    Wish the birds were so confiding in the UK!  With a few gaps in our wader list to be plugged, we headed down there this morning and met up with another Houston Audubon guided walk, led by Sam Woods with Tamie Bulow.  Our target birds were Piping Plover and Long-billed Curlew, having not seen these birds at all on our earlier visit, and today we were in luck.  Not just one but three Piping Plovers just feet away from us, resting and preening allowing us to enjoy a good long view.  The regulars were all there as well: Short-billed Dowitchers, Dunlin, Sanderling, Semi-palmated Sandpiper and Western Sandpiper, Caspian Tern, Royal Tern, Brown and White Pelicans, and today we also enjoyed good views of Red Knot, though sadly not in breeding plumage, and Least Terns.  The three Scoters were just offshore again but with stronger winds today, the sea was too choppy to watch well. No Long-billed Curlew however, so we headed off down Yacht Basin Road to scan the inland sea area.  Here we watched Black Terns fishing just in front of us, while Black Skimmers circled the water slightly further out.  Suddenly, looking up Alan noticed a single Bonaparte's Gull flying past and then a troupe of four American Oystercatchers piped noisily to each other as they passed us, adding themselves to our year list.  Still no curlew here, so we moved on to scan the long wet grasslands alongside the road.  At first nothing showed, then we noticed heads appearing briefly in the grass only to disappear again out of sight.  Long bills, eyestripe, could one of these be our elusive curlew?  Sadly not, try as we might, they refused to be anything other than Whimbrel and Willets.  Then we had a stroke of luck.  Something spooked all the birds and they rose out of the grass, over a hundred birds which had remained hidden from view until then.  They circled briefly then settled back down to feed, but as they rearranged themselves, one bird showed a decidedly longer bill.  Panic as it dipped its head out of sight but then it looked up again.  Unmistakable! and so Long-billed Curlew was added to the list.We returned to High Island to say goodbye to our friends from Tropical Birding, American Birding Association and Houston Audubon at the Birding Information Centre before heading back to Houston airport.  But we just had time to climb up the new canopy tower to test the view, and just as well we did.  Looking down into the garden around the building, we caught sight of an American Goldfinch coming down to the water, an unusual bird here and another new bird for our list.Our timing's not great, a front is heading this way tonight which should bring a good fall of migrants over the next day or so, just as we're heading out of here, but we're sure to get plenty of great new birds in Panama before we come back to Texas next week.  Check out www.birdinghighisland.com to see what's been seen.  We hope to be able to update you with news of our progress in Panama, but not sure how easy internet access will be.
Bird species total: 1955Posted 16th April, High Island, Texas