Our winter migration has come to an end and we are officially back at the Intrigued Headquarters. I am still awaiting monetary gifts of appreciation from our IL based friends for dragging back some warm weather on our way back from Texas (those can be dropped off anytime at our offices!). We were definitely not expecting temps in the mid-50s only a few days after our return. Doubtful that will hold being mid-February and all, but will enjoy it while it lasts. Before we get into today’s international themed post, wanted to mention a few accolades. We here at Intrigued have entered our 19th year of operation from when we started our “mothership” blog as a place to document our experiences and the social encounters that…well…intrigued us.
Over time we started focusing more and more on featuring the “wild” side of life and then I was asked to present at the local Audubon chapter on “Birding and Blogging” to introduce their members to a new-ish media form to get more exposure to their birding passion. This was a great opportunity to curate our love for wildlife and photography and so our sister site Wildlife Intrigued was born – the rest is history as they say…
…and we recently hit the 1,000 post threshold on this sister site!! A big thanks to all our contributors/editors (Linda, Brad, Jan, Allyson, Elfie and the rest of the behind the scenes staff that make the Intrigued complex run smoothly (and mainly keep us out of legal issues ha).
Thanks for indulging us in our accolades, it is time to get you to the reason you are here…BIRDS!
Bringing you a special rarity today as thanks for making it through our intro brags. Hit the jump to learn more about this surprise encounter.
Before we go any further, need to give you a couple of warnings. First, this is NOT my best execution behind the shutter. Conditions were pretty awful the day of this encounter and thanks to a combination of adrenaline jitters and basically blasting through a cascade of different lighting conditions trying to get this bird in the tin, the results were less than desired – apologies to those around me that might have heard my tapestry of cursing during this series ha. The second warning is this story does not have a happy ending. Warnings issued, lets get to the story.
We begin this tale in Galveston Island back in January 2025. Yeah, I’ve been holding on to this lifer for a while hoping to upgrade these shots on our trip south this year (and not have to subject you to the sub-par performance of this first encounter).
The red building with the round window above was absolutely critical to the hunt as that was basically the only clue we had to go on regarding the whereabouts of this bird. We were pouring over all the reports we could find hoping someone would include some detail on how to find it – the sightings markings were scattered about a 4 block radius or so and repeated circling of that area was yielding nothing – not that Linda and I even KNEW what we were looking for – as the classic saying goes, “we will know when we see it”.
Then some tidbits started coming in that the specimen was a juvenile – not what we wanted to hear as that would make the hunt even more difficult as their juvi plumage was quite different than their mature feathering…and as you probably know by now, looking for a brown and buff colored bird is more torture than watching an NSYNC music video.
Fortunately, someone posted a picture of it sitting on a railing next to a red building on one of the Galveston Island piers – now we had something to work with and Linda (my secrete sleuthing weapon) went to work. She noted the round window as a unique identifier to go after…and she found it!! We now knew the place, but that only gets us in the ballpark – we still had to hit the pitch. Our first 2 attempts failed – nothing found that matched the pictures from the eBird reports. On our last day in Galveston, we headed back to the area for a final chance.
Kind of let’s the suspense out of the room, but we obviously found it! Linda drove up to a Cinema that was across the street from the pier. As we entered the parking lot we noticed a group of people standing up at the road…binoculars, scopes, cameras, people in weird floppy hats…a great sign. Linda stayed back at the car while I ran..err.. walked steadily, nonchalantly with confidence up to the group and asked if they had any luck. Not yet, so I added my eyes to the search. Eventually someone exclaimed that they thought it was on the railing off the pier. At that very same moment, I watched in horror as the guy in front of me knocked over his scope in the excitement to look and it hit the asphalt hard. I also noted in equal horror, no one else seemed to care but that is a subject for social behavioral analysis back on the mothership blog.
There were a few cameras in the bunch, but those did not have the reach of The Beast. Got eyes on the suspected “blob” and took a few shots to see if I could confirm – that second shot of the pier above was one of those and you could just tell that the bird in that frame had the characteristics we were on the hunt for. Showed it to a few others in the group leading to a consensus it that was the target. There was great rejoicing…
… for about 5 minutes before the subject took off from the pier in a direction to our right. With the distance and the light conditions it was quickly lost. All but I and one couple tore out after it in hopes of reacquiring it.
I was just simply relieved I got eyes on it finally and although truly craptastic, did manage to get a couple of shots of it for the lifer check. Had a few pleasantries with the other two people that remained back before noticing a large hawk like bird coming directly at us from the opposite direction the others had gone. I pointed and turned back to the couple “Is that it!?!”. The wide eyes confirmed, they got their binoculars on it, I set The Beast on attack mode.
There it was in all its glory – the Yellow-Headed Caracara had done a head fake on the rest of the group and somehow circled back and opted to give us a visual treat. Luckily, it couldn’t detect my awful execution or it would have probably dropped a load on me as it flew past. This South American resident ended up taking a perch on the cinema – that Linda was still parked at so she got an excellent look as well.
Others started showing up – maybe word got back to the original group and some new birders had just driven into the lot – would have been a good day for those individuals to buy a lottery ticket. All of us were keeping our distance and enjoying the encounter – farther away than I would have liked as I had to digitally zoom these perch shots, very thankful it had graced us with a fly-by earlier.
At my core, I enjoy watching people – honestly, probably more than I do birds, ode to being the origin of the Intrigued project. Watching people watching birds, “Crème de la crème”. Watching people watching a bird that is in turn watching us with equal scrutiny – dimension altering ha.
I try my best not to apply anthropomorphism (the attribution of human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities) while out in the field. That leads to trouble and philosophy pretzels that can leave a bitter taste. That doesn’t mean we can’t acknowledge how birds make us feel – like in the case of this next shot.
Clearly our young YH Caracara is looking at me and noting how it flew all the way from South American only to be immortalized in time by a sub-par photographer. Hmm, might have just done what I said I don’t like to do…let’s fix that. The way this rare YH Caracara looked at me as it passed back overhead made me embarrassed on how I performed as a photographer….and it was very disappointed in me… STOP IT BRI!
On the other hand, I can definitely assess the individual that was standing near me and started absolutely screaming at a lady he saw moving toward the bird that by no, had moved to a perch on a light pole in the parking lot. The lady looked visibly shaken as the guy continued berating her even after she had retreated. Our staff has to go through required training every year – guess what one of the main tenets is – “Don’t be a Dumbass in the Field”.
Should the lady have stayed in place for the good of the whole..maybe, but birding is for everyone, not just the long-glassed and there was absolutely no excuse for the very loud tongue lashing she was being given – way to instill “community” into our hobby…but the real annoyance was the fact that once he had gained whatever virtue signaling attention he wanted, he started walking towards the bird and proceeded to get way closer than the lady did – so close that the bird ended up taking flight and leaving the area.
When I returned to Linda in the Jeep, the first thing she says is “Who was that dumbass who was yelling at that lady and proceeded to scare off the bird himself?” That made me laugh…Linda had completed her training hehehe.
Geez, Bri…enough drivel, get me some facts on this rare bird to the US! Sorry, let’s do that now. As mentioned earlier, this Caracara species is localized primarily in South America. They are smaller than their more flamboyant cousins that are regularly seen in south Texas (link here). One would be tempted with that name to think their adult plumage would consist of a bright yellow head. Eh, not really the case as it is really more buff colored that extends down to their ankles (there is yellow-orange on their lores). They do maintain darker wings and a matching eyebrow line that extends back from their eyes. Adult males and females are similar looking.
They are in family Falconidae. As with the Crested variety, they are primarily scavengers and likely hang out with whatever Vultures happen to roam South America. Our specimen here was doing fine with the various pieces of fish being made available by the fishermen on the pier.
Okay, now for the bad news – feel free to leave if you have become attached to this particular specimen…it’s okay, I can wait a few minutes to give you time….
This wayward visitor to the island ended up staying put for nearly a year. I was trying to follow reports off and on just to see if we would be able to see it again – I really wanted to capture its adult plumage. Sure enough, it was being seen at that same pier month after month. Have to say, I was pretty excited about getting it in the tin when we started our southern migration – problem was, we were taking a counterclockwise path this year that wouldn’t see us get to Galveston until early February. A few weeks into our trip, Linda informed me that this Caracara had suffered a seizure and was found dead. They had taken it for further analysis. We were incredibly saddened at the news. We still have the memories though and glad I was able to share with the rest of you.
Life Intrigued 