Rattled in the Field

Everyone involved in the Intrigued Industrial Complex is fully aware of our mission statement, “It’s all about the story, bonus if you get quality shots”. This is supported by two very important strategies: “If there are no shots, it didn’t happen” and “Nobody talks about fight club”. All new members have a two week beat in…sorry, two week class where they are immersed in our corporate strategy. We even have this guiding statement on our coffee mugs, above the corporate HQ entrance and even had it flown on a large banner behind a plane above our corporate retreats to Cancun. Note the past tense there, as those retreats were suspended thanks to what we quietly refer to as “The Incident of 2016”. Thanks to the Federales, that also caused a temporary adoption of a new mission statement “No Hablo Espanol, I Want Our Lawyer”. Sorry Brad you came aboard too late, those were really good times … and why we now have such a large attorney pool. I only bring this up as today’s post is a perfect example of story or image quality.

Hit the jump to learn about how today’s featured bird resulted in the second biggest scare of my birding adventures.

I need to set the stage a bit here to provide the full impact. Linda and I were on our annual trek south a few days before last New Year’s Eve. There was some added stress this year as I was currently short of my 2022 Average Year goal (link here). At the time I think I was around 5 short of 300. Hoping for a few more targets in a last ditch effort, we planned a different route to the Rio Grande Valley which took us through Waco – yes, THE Magnolia Market Waco. Win/win, Linda gets to visit the silos, I get a chance to check off the Harris’s Sparrow. That would be a lifer for me as well as putting me one step closer to the goal.

So we get there fairly late in the day, set up camp over at a nearby COE and run over to a place called Lacey Point which sits on Lake Waco. Light was draining fast and with it any chance of good quality shots. Fortunately, I just needed one good enough to say it happened (see strategy #1). Problem was, I was hunting for a Sparrow I had never seen before in the field in an area I was completely unfamiliar with. I didn’t see any real trails at the time beyond lower vegetation right out from the parking lot. That is where I noticed a number of birds flitting about the tall grass and low branches. I was off, I really needed that check. For the next 20 minutes or so, I wandered about weeds and trees trying to get any shot I could of the birds. Shots were too horrible to tell for sure if it was the Harris’s or a Grasshopper pulling my leg flapping around with two big leaves – will figure it in the digital darkroom – just keep snapping, just keep snapping. Meanwhile Linda was exploring other parts of the parking lot with Merlin hoping for an audio hit.

By now, shots into the undergrowth were coming out nearly black. Figured there was still a chance to pull details out of the Raw, but even visually spotting the birds was getting difficult. Managed to find a deer trail that took me up a bank and surprise, surprise right onto a fairly large fire road/horse trail. I looked back down it and spotted Linda still patrolling the parking lot near the entrance. I decided to explore it a bit more as it was brighter up on this trail. Heading further out, I was busy scanning the trees for any movement when I was met with a “surprise”.

Probably need to drill down deeper into the word “surprise” in this particular situation. Imagine innocently walking along paying no attention to the ground when a teeth rattling shake erupts from the side of the trail maybe 20′ ahead. Paired with this audio cue, a thick object rears out of the weeds, cocks back and holds its position. Ear muff kiddies am going to be honest, I nearly shit my pants. I have NEVER encountered a rattler before and was completely shocked at how massive that rattle sound was. Finally got my heart beat regulated and assessed the situation. It was big, it was a rattler and based on my limited Snake knowledge, likely venomous. The entire last 20 minutes was rapidly replaying through my head now with this added spice sprinkled in.

We were at a stalemate of sorts. I wasn’t going to leave until I got some sort of picture and it was bound and determined to keep me from getting a clean shot. I moved laterally, it moved slightly to make sure there was some weed or obstruction in front of its head. The rattler sound was still coming from the weeds some distance away which implied to me this beast was long. Desperate I gingerly bowled a couple of small rocks in its direction. That produced exactly ZERO reaction beyond a significant increase in rattle frequency and what I assume a much sterner look. What the hell, up to this point I thought Snakes preferred to keep their distance from humans – this one wanted to kill me and spit on my grave. Doubt they care much about their babies (purely speculation on my part as I live in IL – we don’t get the ones with baby toys on their tails). While weighing next steps, it hit me… where was LINDA!! If she saw me intent on something she might venture out to see what’s up. She sees this we are driving straight to Mayo Clinic, do not pass Go, do not collect your $200.

It was getting dark now and I was not comfortable playing Jim Fowler without a better background on these Rattlers. Need a phone of friend here as I am unable to confidently identify this specific species – I swear snakes are worse than differentiating juvi Sparrows. I would have to guess it is a Diamondback as the Copperheads do not seem to have that thinner lighter stripe in the bands. If you have a better ID, please let me know in the comments – will be greatly appreciated.

Time to get back on our featured feathered friend. As you can tell, I did manage to get shots of the Harris’s Sparrow. Oh, before I go any further, I have no idea why it is Harris’s and not Harris’. I never cease to be puzzled by the naming bodies. I had to pull this bird out of some pretty dark shots – all hail the savior RAW format. At the cost of quality, I definitely got visuals to properly ID this Sparrow – I’d hate to have missed it after the shock of that Snake.

The Harris’s reminds me a lot of the male House Sparrow (link here). They both have a black bib of sorts, but in the House that extends further down into the chest, where this Sparrow breaks up a bit before then. The black on the Harris’s then extends up to and back across the top of the head. They also have a pink bill vs the House’s black one. This specimen is in its non-breeding plumage which has a brown wash on the sides of the face and on the flanks. These will turn grey when they hit the frisky season.

I was surprised by the lack of texture in the back through the tail and the back of the neck. Many in the Sparrow family show a lot more barring in that area.

If you happen to be on either of our coasts, you will need to travel into the interior to experience this particular Sparrow. For a Sparrow, they definitely have a narrow range right down the middle of the States. According to Cornell, they winter in Texas up through Nebraska and then take the fast train up to the northern boundary tundra of Canada for the repopulation cycle.

To close out a couple of unique tidbits on this Sparrow from Cornell’s site. It is the 2nd largest of the NA Sparrows conceding size only to the Towhees. To be honest, they didn’t seem that big in the woods, but there wasn’t many other Sparrow species in the area that would have given me a better reference. They were definitely smaller than that beast of a Snake ha. Lastly, this bird was named after John Audubon’s friend Edward Harris (no, not Mitch Wilkinson link here). So it is possessive, which brings me back to the Harris’ argument.

Definitely long on today’s post. Apologies for that, but thought you might enjoy the side story (especially as compensation for the degraded shots). Take care everyone and remember…Nobody talks about fight club.