BlueRavenBirders

Melinda and I did one short birding expedition near Italy TX, and looked for birds everywhere we went including a brief side trip to White Rock Lake in Dallas to view the Monk Parakeets just before dropping me off at the conference hotel.

A few of the standout birds included:

Gru, the great blue heron that lives in Melinda’s pond. This one was taken outside of Mike’s house.

The resident domestic ducks From Mike’s house:

From Mom’s house:

I finally have my ducks in a row…

Vulture’s trying to line up

Grackles in a large puddle near the market

Female grackle

More vultures, this time they are the clean up crew for the road

More of Gru, this time from Mom’s house

I do think grackles are beautiful even if they are a noisy nuisance. The iridescence on this lovely great tailed grackle’s feathers is stunning.

This red shouldered hawk I originally identified as a coopers. He was very small and far away. It is only with the camera and then the computer that we were finally able to see him clearly enough to really identify him. Have I said how much I LOVE my new lens? Well, I do.

And then there was the gorgeous feral flock of monk parakeets

I’ll need to add my bird list from the week eventually, I just can’t seem to find it. I do know it included:

Common grackles
Great tailed grackles
European starlings
Eurasian collared doves
Rock doves
Cardinals
Blue jays
White crowned sparrows
Red shouldered hawk
Black vultures
Turkey vultures
and more…

— Jenny