Bird count along the Bosque River Trail August 25, 2025. Yellow birds everywhere.

Weather - mostly clear right overhead but clouds to the north and south, no wind, temp ~80 degrees at 7:00am. At 9:30 its mostly cloudy. There might be light showers to the west. Very humid..

Bird count - Moderate number of bird types, but low bird numbers.

Yellow birds - Today I saw bright yellow birds in three locations. I saw two yellow birds about 1/3 of the way north along the hayfield. I saw a yellow bird sitting high in a tree in the same area. I saw three yellow birds along the river by the tennis courts. All of these birds were bright yellow. The heads, main bodies, and tails were yellow. One bird had darker wings. I got pictures, unfortunately fuzzy, of two of the yellow birds. I’m pretty sure all these bright yellow birds are Yellow Warblers. These birds move a lot. They very rarely sit still for long.

Painted Bunting - I saw a green female Painted Bunting near Puddle 1. The Bunting flew down out of a tree and landed on a dead branch in the dried up river bed.

Carolina Wrens - I saw three small, red-brown birds chasing each other. They flew low across the path in front of me chattering the whole way. I only saw them briefly, but I think they were Carolina Wrens.

Hummingbirds - I briefly saw two Hummingbirds again at the wildflower garden. They flew off before I could get a good look at them.

Mississippi Kites - Mississippi Kite sightings have gotten rare. Today I didn’t see any. They winter south of the border, so maybe they have already started to migrate home.

Puddle 1 - Puddle 1 is pretty small right now. Its getting very shallow. I think it’s only a foot or two deep. A Great Blue heron was standing in the middle of the puddle today, so I could estimate how deep the water was. I could only spot small black catfish today, because the water was muddy. However, there are still some Perch in the puddle. I know this because there was one brown snake swimming around trying to catch fish, and the snake wasn’t interested in the small black catfish. When I first saw all the fish in the puddle a few weeks ago, I thought there were going to be a lot of dead fish in the river channel when the puddle dried up. I’m not sure now that this is the case. The predators, brown snakes, herons, racoons, foxes, and even domestic cats seem to be rapidly eating the fish trapped in the puddle. The only question is whether the puddle or the fish are going to disappear first.

Puddle 2 and 3 - I saw five perch and a turtle in Puddle 2 and nothing in Puddle 3. I’m very curious as to why Puddle 1 has such an extraordinary number of fish in it, while Puddle 2 and 3 which are about the same size have relatively few fish in them.

Bird types - 19 - 20 Bird numbers - 68

Number‍ ‍Type

13 starlings

12 Grackles

6 Cardinals

6 Robins

6 Yellow Warblers

4 Mockingbirds

3 Carolina Wrens - I think that’s what they were

3 White Winged Doves

2 Mourning Doves

2 Hummingbirds - type unknown

2 Bluejays

1 Hawk - type unknown

1 Eastern Phoebe

1 Painted Bunting - female

1 Tufted Titmouse

1 Sparrow - type unknown

1 Red Bellied Woodpecker

1 House Finch

1 Barn Swallow

Belted Kingfisher - several times I thought I head the chittering of Belted Kingfishers. I never saw any.