Another trip to Lamar, counting whooping cranes

It had been a couple of weeks since we had last gone to Lamar to see the whooping cranes, so we grabbed the cameras and crossed the Copano Bay Bridge. Driving along the St Charles Bay Road we saw cars along Eighth Street and that’s a great sign. The Whoopers had arrived for lunch and so we stopped and counted twelve birds.

Four others were flying away, bringing our total count to sixteen of the magnificent, endangered cranes.

The bird lined up. They were waiting for the feeder to start dispensing corn, and it looked like a bunch of snowbirds in our Recreation Hall! The birds do have a pecking order and the dominant whoopers are always first.

Some sandhills cranes were also waiting nearby and being smaller they wait patiently for the whoopers to allow them to also feed on the free handouts. In addition, a flock of rock doves, pigeons, flew in to wait for their turn. Meanwhile a large flock of Rosette Spoonbills napped in the warm sun.

The one thing we have not seen this year is the huge alligator that sunned itself in the backyard of a nearby beach house. Perhaps the reptile had been moved or more likely harvested. I certainly would not like such a large cold-blooded predator living in my backyard. The Texas flock now numbers over five hundred birds. It’s a success story as the flock at one time only numbered sixteen. The count was only twenty nine in the entire world. Hats off to all who saved the beautiful birds! Clear skies

Watching a dolphin fish in Rockport's Harbor

December has been an extremely busy month! Between Renita shopping and my rush to make jewelry, we haven’t done a lot of exploring. So, when our friend John told us about a place where we could catch fish from shore, we decided to take a short drive down Waters Street. Parking, we grabbed our phones and polarized sunglasses and headed out for a short walk along a small, protected part of the Harbor. As we neared the end of the walkway a dolphin surfaced.

It had been doing its own fishing and didn’t stop just because it had an audience. The large male dolphin would swim and herd the school of mullet into a frenzied mass before it would dive under and rising through the school emerge with a fresh fish in its mouth! I

t was the first time we have ever seen a dolphin with a fish in its mouth, and the first time it had a large mullet or speckled trout! Swallowing its meal it then hurried to cause the school to panic into a tight group before it again dive and then rose through the middle of the school with another lunch in its mouth! We only had our phones for pictures, (the pictures are Renita's using her old I phone), so they are not the best but she caught the action. Now that Christmas is over, we hope to do some fishing ourselves. Renita is excited about the new fishing reel Santa left her! Clear skies

Our fishing report, Texas 2025

I never thought of retirement as time to relax. One friend, a retired English teacher told me to never sit in a rocking chair as you will end up rocking your life away. You may also think you have lots of time, but when you retire you find out that time is the most precious thing you have left, so don’t waste it! I haven’t posted a new blog in a while because there is never enough time, so here is a brief catchup post. My time for the first half of December has been spent fishing and making jewelry for next year’s shows. The fishing was good, for the most part. My friend Dave and I have been concentrating on black drum. He did catch and release a thirty-six-inch red fish, one that big is a spawner and must be released) My big fish so far is a thirty-five-inch black drum, about 21 pounds. Thats too big to keep and so it was released unharmed. We have caught and eaten slot sized black drum, which is between fourteen to thirty inches and they taste great. Many anglers here in Texas prefer Red Fish but we like sheepshead, black drum, and speckled trout, (I don’t even mention flounder because its rare for us to catch a keeper.

The cold fronts are driving the speckled trout away from the shore, where we have been catching them on crankbaits. Our friend Dan did catch a beautiful 20-inch sheepshead which will feed two to four people. Today a cold front with winds from 20-30 mph is coming through so it’s a good time to catch upon the blog (which is our journal about retirement, its a way for us to remember and we have now been retired for eighteen yaers). I also have some repair work to do on our rv, if you didn’t know the initals rv, stands for repair vehicle. So hopefully I will get the work done early and go back to having fun, making jewelry while we watch the Broncos play the Green Bay Packers. Go Broncos! Clear skies

A Flock of Ten Whooping Cranes, November 28th, 2025

We had heard that the Whooping Cranes had arrived in Lamar. They usual are here by mid to late October but we had only had reports of three present in the field alongside St Charles Bay. Nearing Eighth Street we saw stopped cars and as we turned south we spotted a group of ten! It’s unusual to see so many in one spot, this flock was composed of eight adults and two colts, (young of the year with brown and white plumage). The colts are given that name as they prance around after leaving the nest. By the time they are here in Texas we usually see them with their heads down feeding voraciously after the long flight from northern Canada.

The adults were calling to each other, with their necks stretched out straight up into the sky. There were numerous calls, or warnings, and it was a vocal fight of ownership of the field.

Pairs and then a single bird decided to look elsewhere for their own territory, (each family will claim an area of about one and a half miles. Two took off and flew south to a feeder located in a field edged with cattails.

The single flew in circles, and another pair took off, heading towards the back bay. We often see a pair when we kayak St Charles Bay and travel by motorboat to Dunham’s Bay. The latter bay borders the Intracoastal. The intracoastal is filled with barges which the Whooping Cranes ignore. It’s an area called the Blackjack Peninsula. The Aransas Wildlife Refuge owns most of the area and frequently sets controlled burns. The whoopers follow the fires and feed on exposed snakes, (The snakes are a safely killed by the cranes and are then swallowed whole). At one point two families Males, approached each other. They then raised their necks and squared off as if to fight. However, one of the pairs backed off and leapt into the air looking for a more welcome place.

There were numerous Whooping Cranes flying around us, before disappearing over the trees. Three sandhill cranes stood by and watched the departures, (they are smaller, shorter, than the Whoopers), and will push their luck before backing off when challenged.

The adult Whoopers are a fearsome opponent, a little over five feet tall, and have been documented as killing a feral hog which approached their young. The adult had hit the pig in the head and had killed it instantly. That’s how strong their beaks are! We decided to drive to 12th street hoping for a closer view, but we couldn’t find one. Several Rosette Spoonbills perched in a tree, and an American Kestrel preened itself near Big Tree.

Having had a great morning birding, it was time to head back to our fifth wheel to upload the pictures and rest up for the nights card game of Joker and Pegs. Clear skies. Ps If you want to see Whooping Cranes up close. Go to the small town of Lamar and drive along St Charles Bay. They are a lot closer than you will usually find them at the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge

Warbirds, the 2025 Fall Commemorative Fly in at Rockport, Texas

For the past three years, the Commemorative Air Force has held a fall fly in at the Rockport, Texas Airport.

Several days before the start date, old war planes begin to fly overhead of our Rv Park. Being near the airport it’s fun to see the old biplanes.

While we have seen many of the planes before there were three warbirds that I was especially interested in seeing. These were the F4F Wildcat, the F6F Hellcat, and the TBD Douglas Devasator Torpedo Bomber.

The F4F Wildcat had borne the brunt of aerial combat during the first part of the Pacific battles during World War Two. It was inferior to the Japanese Zero, especially if it tried to turn inside the Japanese Fighter. The development of the F6F Hellcat changed things as that plane had a kill ratio of 19:1.

A Parachute jump was supposed to take place, but it didn’t happen while we were there. The wind was gusting thirty miles per hour, and it wasn’t safe for the jumpers. However, inside the hanger a display was set up showing the gear carried by the Paratroopers. My Uncle Manly was a Paratrooper during World War Two and fought at Bastogne.

Another display inside the hanger was of the women who delivered the warbirds. The military didn’t allow women to fly combat missions until 1993 over Bosnia. The first three women were not identified until much later.

In the picture of the equipment table, you can see a foldable M1 Garand that was hated by the Paratroopers. There was a display table loaded with gear including a mess tin, (the mess tin of a paratrooper consisted of one large spoon). It was a fun but hot day under the sun, something that we just aren’t used to, (we live in Wyoming). Renita and I had no interest in flying in planes older than we are, (you may purchase a ride in many of them). Thank you to all who worked to make the fly-in a success. It’s great to be able to see examples of living history, Clear skies

Port Aransas, November 2025, an easy morning of birding and sightseeing

Our friends Dave and Jane invited us over for a day of fun at Port Aransas. They drove their van, they no longer travel with their diesel truck. It’s pretty fancy and different as we have never owned a van. The trip takes about twenty minutes, (if you don’t count the wait for the ferry, which was longer than usual this day). After crossing the ferry. we turned right and drove to the Leorna Turnbill Birding Center. They had read that a flamingo had returned to the park and as we walked to the first large salt marsh it was easy to see.

It had been seen at another marsh, far from the boardwalk, but we were lucky as it had flown closer. Of course, I felt foolish as I had only brought my phone, having left my camera and large lens at home in our fifth wheel trailer. The pictures aren’t great, and I even tried to take a small video of it as it fed by sweeping its large black bill back and forth along the muddy bottom. When feeding It sticks its whole head under water as it works back and forth along the bottom.

Of course, the American White Pelicans were present, along with Blue Wing Teal and Black Necked Stilts. Two Least Grebes, rare birds, fed below us, but I couldn’t get a picture of them before they disappeared into the tall rushes. We did not see any Whooping Cranes. We also did not see the large alligator as it was reported to be near the water tower. Our next stop was at the Jetty where we watched as ships came in and Dolphins fed. There were lots of people fishing on both the North and South Jetties, but we didn’t see them do any catching.The swells were large and a small boat, fishing near the end, rose up and down and almost disappeared into the trough. It would not be a good day for anyone with sea sickness, (I have been fortunate in that it has never bothered me). We did stop at the usual Mexican Restaurant for lunch. It’s so nice to have proper spicy food after the bland Mexican food served in most places in Star Valley. There were reporrs of a new bird, a Grooved Billed Ani. but we never saw it. It was a pleasant day, thanks Dave and Jane for inviting us along! Clear skies

Conspicuous Consumption, The Bishops Palace, Galveston

Years ago, but after we retired, we traveled to Rhode Island and toured the Vanderbilt Summer Home. It’s a classic example of Conspicuous Consumption. The Robber Barons built huge monuments to themselves with the riches they had acquired both legally and often illegally stealing money and land from the public trust.

In or about 1894 Walter Gresham built a palace in Galveston, Texas for himself and his family. We have often driven by the Bishops Palace, it was later acquired by the Catholic Church and eventually became the home of the Catholic Bishop, hence the name. When built, the palace was made from the finest materials and survived, mostly intact, the Great Hurricane that destroyed most of the Island. The self-guided tour of the Palace took about two hours and was worth the fourteen dollars per person admission. The floors were made with inlayed wood patterns, much like the home we saw in Kansas. The windows were stained glass, some with their children pictured. Some of the windows were changed by the bishop after he moved into the palace. One is on the Grand Stairway and is a picture of Holy Mother Mary. A conservatory made up one of the first floor room, alone with the reading room which was called the Silver Room.

Another room was the library filled with all the Classics.

The children were dressed in outfits that mirrored the fancy clothes of the adults. The formal dining room was decorated with wood carvings of Neptune.

Attached to that was the kitchen, also in the upstairs bathrooms, were three faucets for water, hot cold, and rainwater for washing one hair.

One of the bedrooms had been changed into a bedroom for the Bishop, and another into an Altar for the Bishop to celebrate Mass. The third floor was closed, as was the lorest level. Massive repairs are being done to save the building.We enjoyed the tour and recommend it! Its rare that I make reading suggestions, but do a search on Robber Barons of the Guilded age. The parallels to today are obvious. Clear skies