Dauphin Island - Part 2

It has been amazing birding on this small island.  What a great three weeks it has been so far, with over 165 species of birds including 29 species of warblers.  Locals say it is the best it has been in years.

Six-lined Racer

Laughing Gulls - laughing

Solitary Sandpiper near Fort Gains east of the RV Park

Feathers fly as this Merlin plucks a Wood Thrush

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker 

Peregrine Falcon comes in for a landing

Lincoln Sparrow

Ruddy Turnstone

White Milkweed on the Dunes

Blue Grosbeak and Painted Bunting with Indigo Buntings

Blackburnian Warbler

Black-throated Blue Warbler

Two male Summer Tanagers, one in the molt 

Two Dickcissels in center of Indigo Buntings, Blue Grosbeak and House Sparrows

Great Egret gets too close to Red-winged Blackbird nest

Female Spider with egg sack on Banded Water Snake

White-eyed Vireo

Bobolinks coming from South America, rest stop

Pelican "Island" on the south side of Dauphin - full of terns, shorebirds and Brown Pelicans

Ida scoping out the point, very cool morning

One of a dozen Least Terns fishing in the gulf

Great Blue Heron stalks the beach

Piping Plover

Dunlin

Osprey brings Mullet to the nest

Wood Thrush

Opossum surprised anyone's up yet

Kentucky Warbler

Yellow-billed Cuckoo, very tired from the flight across the gulf

Red-bellied Woodpecker grabs a Tree Frog for lunch

Bay-breasted Warbler

Early morning, we drove to the small airport, and this Red Fox was the only movement on the tarmac.

Clapper Rail

Peregrine Falcon catches breakfast - a Summer Tanager

Reddish Egret near the airport

One of the many Scarlet Tanagers coming through

Rising Moon being held up by one of the dead pine snags - many woodpeckers love pounding on the hollow logs.

We have another week to enjoy here, we don't think it can get any better than it has been, but who knows... a new bird is just around the next bend in the trail.

Love & Prayers,
Ty & Ida Baumann

Dauphin Island, Alabama

Cattle & Snowy Egrets

We crossed over Mobile Bay on the ferry to Dauphin Island for our month stay for Spring bird migration.  Many birds that winter in South and Central America cross the Gulf of Mexico and this is the first land in the U.S.

Our Campground is adjacent to the Audubon Bird Sanctuary and we walked the trails every day to see what birds had arrived.  We had two big "fall outs" where the cold fronts stopped migration and hundreds of birds fed on the many insects in the area.  Absolutely fabulous birding!!

Great Horned Owl, a daily observation, one day there were 3

Gaillard Lake at the Audubon Sanctuary

One large Alligator at the lake and Great Blue Heron

Protonotary Warbler looking for lunch

Found it!!

How could Ty NOT take another photo of these beauties

Peregrine Falcon high in the pine tree checks out an intruder, a Merlin

Eastern Bluebirds look like they are checking out nest sites

Magnolia Blossom and Bud

Worm-eating Warbler

We went with birding friends we had met in Texas two years ago to Shell Mound Park (built on Oyster Shells that the Indians piled hundreds of years ago).  It is quite a migrant trap.  Someone put corn out for the Indigo Buntings.

Blue-winged Warbler

Swainson's Warbler, a rare treat

Louisiana Waterthrush 

Hooded Warbler

Summer Tanager, all tuckered out from flight

Painted Bunting

Indigo Bunting

Red-eyed Vireo grabs a wasp

Prairie Warbler, note breeding plumage red on back

Worm-eating Warbler 

Yellow-throated Vireo

A tree frog gets kicked out of his hiding place by the birds

Yellow-billed Cuckoo

Our next door neighbor couldn't keep up with all the Ruby-throated Hummingbirds that were coming in.

Cerulean Warbler

Green Anole

Blue Grosbeak

Kentucky Warbler

Swainson's Warbler

We are looking forward to another two weeks on Dauphin Island.  When we aren't birding we are enjoying the white sandy beaches along the Gulf.  This is sunrise over the oil rigs and if you look carefully, you will see a Northern Gannet flying.

Love & Prayers,
Ty & Ida Baumann