This pre-festival trip will explore some of the best birding spots on the Clear Lake Loop of the Upper Texas Coast – Great Texas Coastal Birding Trail. This area contains a variety of habitats, including approximately 60 acres of oak woodlands, riparian edge habitat along the bayou, freshwater ponds, wetlands, and bay waters. This amazing habitat diversity attracts a wide variety of resident and migratory bird species, as well as other wildlife such as turtles, deer, alligators, and swamp rabbits.
We’ll hike along the well-maintained trail system looking for raptors including Osprey, Red-shouldered Hawk, and Cooper’s Hawk; songbirds including White-eyed Vireo, Painted Bunting, Rose-breasted Grosbeak, orioles, and warblers, shorebirds including Black-bellied Plover, Ruddy Turnstone, and Willet, and Brown Pelican, Neotropic Cormorant, herons, egrets, and other wading birds. After a break for lunch, we’ll check for Red-breasted Merganser, Bufflehead, Common Goldeneye, and other duck species on lakes near the bay.
Bring: water, lunch, sunscreen, bug spray
This is a meet-at-site trip. Driving directions will be emailed prior to the trip.
Photo: Jan Hanson