Day 2 - The Skimmer

This is the second time we've taken the Skimmer bird-watching boat tour of Aransas. It's also the second time we've gotten great sights of Whooping Cranes. But the cool thing about this tour is that Captain Tommy Moore is a real birder -- and he points out a lot of other birds along the way. I only have a few pictures, but a lot of birds. Those displayed in the photos are highlighted in Bold Red print.

While I don't have pictures of all the birds we saw, and I tried to check only those I saw, my list included: Eared Grebe,

White and Brown Pelicans, Great Blue Heron and Great Egret, White and White-faced Ibis, Roseate Spoonbill, Black and Turkey Vultures, Gadwall and Mottled Duck, Northern Pintail, Common Goldeneye,

an Osprey,












Crested Caracara, Sanhill Crane, Whooping Crane, Black Bellied Plover, American Oyster- catcher, Long-billed Cerlew, Ruddy Turnstone, Laughing Gulls (of course), and Forster's Tern.

Parting Shots

A last couple of shots from Port Aransas. While we were there, this skimmer (right) was really working the tidal pool (it's a large pool, but probably not a pond as I said before -- it's pretty shallow, I think).

This skimmer went back and forth -- skimming! You may or may not be able to tell that the bottom beak is longer than the top -- that enables him to skim the top of the water with this lower beak in the water. He was really flying fast, and it was very difficult to get a good shot.

There were a lot of black necked stilts there as well. This one was walking right below the walkway, and I was able to get some close shots. This one's legs are not as bright red as some, but you can see that it's eye is right below the white spot on it's head. Curious...