Central Louisiana Birding & Wildlife: Loose Alliance Field Trip to Kisatchie National Forest & Catahoula Hummingbird and Butterfly Garden (Grant Parish) -- 5/19/18

Catahoula Hummingbird and Butterfly Garden

Related Posts:
   Loose Alliance field trips:http://falloutbird2014.blogspot.com/2018/05/loose-alliance-field-trip-to-sicily.html
& http://falloutbird2014.blogspot.com/2017/09/alexandria-lakes-district-field-trip.html

   This location:http://falloutbird2014.blogspot.com/2017/12/kisatchie-nf-and-catahoula-hummingbird.html
& http://falloutbird2014.blogspot.com/2017/08/kisatchie-national-forest-and-catahoula.html

    I have three more blog entries that'll I'll be posting over the next 36 - 48 hours, and I'll link them here once each is posted. They cover Spring observations for three of my usual locations -- Zimmer Creek Road (La Salle Parish), Snyder Road (La Salle P.), and Catahoula NWR (La Salle & Catahoula Ps.)
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   The Loose Alliance bird club May field trip was to the Catahoula Hummingbird and Butterfly Garden and adjacent part of Kisatchie National Forest, located on Work Center Road, near the Forest Service office off LA-8, east of Bentley, in Grant Parish. The field trip was led by Jay Huner, with Emlyn Smith (of the forest service), Marty Floyd, Joy and Roger Bradford, Jackie Duncan, and myself participating. Jackie led a wildflower walk for Cenla master naturalist students immediately following the bird club activities, which several of us also attended.
   We began the birding at the garden, 7:30 am. There, species included Red-headed Woodpecker, Gray Catbird, Brown Thrasher, and Orchard Oriole, to name a few.

burnt woods adjacent to the garden

A short walk down the trail to the edge of the grassy pine woods SW of the garden gave us an opportunity to see Brown-headed Nuthatch, Pine Warbler, Chipping Sparrow, and Indigo Bunting.

view south of the garden, Kisatchie NF

After this we rode over to a location across LA-8 from the garden to check in on the Red-cockaded Woodpeckers.

Thanks to Emlyn's camera-on-a-pole device, used to monitor the nests with minimal disturbance, we were able to see an image of a baby RCWP in the nest.

RCWP nest hole

the future of this endangered species

With the adults approaching, we backed off to allow the birds to carry on about their business. Birds heard singing while at this location included Red-eyed and White-eyed Vireos, Hooded Warbler, Bachman's Sparrow, and Yellow-breasted Chat.
Back at the garden, as the bird trip wound down and the wildflower walk was starting, we spotted one of the Red-cockaded Woodpeckers from the (failed) nest adjacent to the garden, and heard an additional Bachman's Sparrow singing off in the woods to the southwest. More on the wildflower walk and other observations (herps, butterflies) after the bird list.

Birds:

May 19, 2018
7:30 am - 9:30 am
7 birders
~0.3 miles
sunny, warm, not much wind.

Turkey Vulture - 2
Mourning Dove - 2
Ruby-throated Hummingbird - 1
Red-headed Woodpecker - 2

Red-headed Woodpecker

Red-bellied Woodpecker - 2
Red-cockaded Woodpecker - 4

Red-cockaded Woodpecker

Pileated Woodpecker - 1
Eastern Wood-Pewee - 2
Great Crested Flycatcher - 1
Eastern Kingbird - 2
White-eyed Vireo - 1
Red-eyed Vireo - 1
Blue Jay - 2
American Crow - 1
Carolina Chickadee - 2
Tufted Titmouse - 1
Brown-headed Nuthatch - 3

Brown-headed Nuthatch

Carolina Wren - 2
Blue-gray Gnatcatcher - 1
Eastern Bluebird - 2

Eastern Bluebird (female)

Wood Thrush - 1
Gray Catbird - 2

Gray Catbird

Brown Thrasher - 4

Brown Thrasher

Northern Mockingbird - 4
Hooded Warbler - 1
Pine Warbler - 6
Prairie Warbler - 2
Bachman's Sparrow - 2
Chipping Sparrow - 2

Chipping Sparrow

Eastern Towhee - 3
Yellow-breasted Chat - 2
Northern Cardinal - 2
Blue Grosbeak - 1
Indigo Bunting - 4

Indigo Bunting (male)

Orchard Oriole - 2

Orchard Oriole (female)

Brown-headed Cowbird - 1

The wildflower walk for members of the Cenla master naturalists class began at 9:30 a.m. I am not enrolled in the class myself, so I was grateful to get to tag along, as I learned more on wildflower i.d. in an hour than I might on my own over many trips to the field and many hours pouring through online plant identification guides. We began by walking the garden; learning the names of the native (and a few nonnative) plants found there. After that, we ventured out into the meadow west of the garden and located and identified many types of wildflowers.

meadow west of garden, location of many of the wildflowers

Some of those found in this wild setting included (in no particular order): Colicroot (Aletris)

Colicroot

... Wild Petunia (Ruellia), Meadow-Beauty (Rhexia)....

Meadow-Beauty

... Florida Bluehearts (Buchnera floridana)

Florida Bluehearts (Buchnera floridana)

... Milkwort (Polygala)

Milkwort

... Procession Flower (Polygala incarnata)

my tentative i.d.: Polygala incarnata ...I don't recall our i.d for these from the field

... Narrowleaf Mountainmint (Pycnanthemum tenuifolium)

Narrowleaf Mountainmint (I believe that's correct)

... Yellow Stargrass (Hypoxis)

Hypoxis

... Goatsrue (Tephrosia), Black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia hirta), and last, but most certainly not least, Winecup (Callirhoe).

Callirhoe (common names include Winecup and Poppy-mallow) are some of my favorite wildflowers

Callirhoe

In addition to birds and wildflowers...

Herps:

Green Anole -

Green Anole

Prairie Lizard -

a male Prairie Lizard (Sceloporus consobrinus), formally Eastern Fence Lizard (S. undulatus) but now may be considered separate species http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/64156/0