January Park Journal
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Year
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Date
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1 January
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| 2009 | With the tempreature at 43F but little wind, it was a wonderful day to see how the forest and park are beginning the new year.
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| 2005 | Overcast, and quite warm, at 64F, the new year begins with not that many birds in the park, but one new bird, a Cooper's hawk, which flies directly overhead, along the very east edge of the park. My intention is to start a park list this year. I have been inspired in this by Perry, who has been birding Arbor Hills park, just at the edge of Collin, Denton and Dallas county for several years. He has 131 species of birds this past year, and just passed 150 species a few days before the end of the year. There is no web site to point you to, but perhaps this will change during this years?? |
| 2003 | Cool and clear this afternoon, with tempreatures in the 50s. The unusal birds for the day were a blue-headed vireo and two golden-crowned kinglets, both birds that are not rare, but ones I seldom see, and birds with beautiful plumages. While I saw no robins this year, I see I did have blue-headed vireo last year on this date. And the nandina are again in fine red trim. For a full list you can check here. |
| 2002 | Went for a walk on both sides of Lochwood Park this fine New Years morning. Tempreature was 39oF at 9:40 am when I started. Found at least 11 robins drinking from the stream below the picnic benches (see photo at left). The nandina berries are now in full color, creating red accents thoroughout the forest. For a full list of the 20 species seen, click here. Best birds were a blue-headed vireo, and two muscovy ducks that seem to have been dumped at the pond. |
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1996
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For perhaps an hour this evening ~9-10 PM - it snowed! Wonderful, big, swirling, drifting clouds of snow. I was out driving in it, and under every streelight a cloud of flakes danced, and well-lite intersections were like theatres in which snow drifted across, in huge, but orderly choruses. A cold day generally, gray all day, with sleet preceeding the snow. |
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1987
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Snow! Only lasted for one day: most fell during the night. |
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5 January
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2002
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While this has nothing to do with Lochwood Park, it does have to do with a bird I have dreamed of seeing most of my life. Snowy owls (Nyctea scandiaca) figure in the legends of most northern people. The heaviest, and nearly the largest, owl in North America, it is also a bird of the Arctic, and seldom seen in the lower 48 states. For the last month or so, one has been seen regularly in the middle of Oklahoma. I drove up today, just to see this great and delightful bird. This small picture hardly does it justice, but I am glad after more than 35 years to have seen one, even if it was not in Texas. |
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24 January
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2002
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I don't want to make this a regular feature, but another bird of the far north has been seen far to the south. The first Texas record for a gyrfalcon (Falco rusticolus) was seen in Lubbock, Texas this week. Another fellow and I drove out to see it, arriving at 2 AM in Lubbock. It was dimly visible on the water tower where it has been roosting every night. While the photo at the left is a poor one, taken through my telescope, it does show a little of the regal look of this bird, most likely an immature female. For some better pictures, you can go here to Martin Reid's page. This is a bird that seldom is seen outside of Canada, and rarely in the northern United States. |
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31 January
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| 1999 | First northern cardinals (Cardinalis cardinalis) heard singing, rather than just calling. |
