Dec 20 2008
OK, here is where the American Ornithologist’s Union and I part company. They still officially consider the green, Red-bellied Woodpecker-sized woodpeckers that occur in Northeastern Mexico to be a distinctive subspecies of the Golden-Olive Woodpecker Colaptes rubiginosus, a wide-ranging neotropical species. They designate these birds as Colaptes r. aeruginosus, the “Bronze-winged Woodpecker.” I say–and this is hardly a [...]
Dec 18 2008
I’ve got a thing for yellowthroats. I always thought they were cute and had lots of personality–everyone thinks that. Otherwise, they weren’t especially on my radar. But traveling into Mexico at the dawn of the 1990′s really turned my head around. Of course, there was the opportunity to see Gray-crowned Yellowthroat (click that link for [...]
Dec 17 2008
Ever throw a really cool party, then go into semi-hibernation until you recovered? That’s pretty much what’s happened to me since hosting I and the Bird #90 last week. My sincere thanks to all who showed up, both bloggers and readers. It was really nice having you all stop by. Getting back to the Mexico [...]
Dec 04 2008
We set off for a 4-night trip to northeast Mexico on Halloween. After an uneventful border crossing and about 4 hours of driving south through the ranch lands, we arrived at the Hacienda Santa Engracia, pictured above. A favorite lodging of our friend and hostess, Marci Fuller, the Hacienda was indeed charming–you could spend many [...]
Dec 01 2008
Marci, Liz, & Me at El Nacimiento del Rio Sabinas, photo © Jim White El Nacimiento means birth, but it’s also used to denote a spring where a river rises. There are a couple of nacimientos in the El Cielo area, but the one that is closest to my heart is that of the Rio [...]
Nov 18 2008
The exit (or entrance) to the Panamá Canal, looking from Gatún Locks toward the Caribbean Sea It’s time–finally–for me to finish with a few last images from mid-October’s press tour with the Panama La Verde group. When I left off, we had just had a whirlwind day in the Albrook-Gamboa area. We only had two more days, one [...]
Nov 14 2008
Don’t know that I’ll become a weekly participant in Skywatch Friday, but it is Friday and I had what I thought was a cool picture of the sky, so here goes. I took this picture November 1, just at sunrise, in the foothills of the Sierra Madre northwest of Ciudad Victoria, in the state of [...]
Nov 10 2008
Crossing the U.S. – Mexico border, Los Indios Free Trade Bridge The picture above was taken when we were entering Mexico on Halloween morning, nearly two weeks ago. We returned to the U.S. on Election Day, in body, anyway. In the bureaucratic world, it turns out, we are still in Mexico. Or perhaps we are [...]
Oct 31 2008
Birders along the Rio Sabinas, Tamaulipas, Mexico, November 2007 They all went to Mexico Buenas dias, got to go Tengo que obedecer Mi corazon –Greg Brown, “They All Went to Mexico” See you all in a couple of days–don’t forget to vote!
Oct 29 2008
On the recent Panama press trip, all our days were full ones, but the one that stands out as the fullest was the one we spent along the canal’s east side in the Albrook/Gamboa/Pipeline Road area. It would have been tight to cover this much territory in four days–doing it in one was way, way [...]
