Bird count along the waterlogged Bosque River Trail July 13 2026

Weather - overcast, dark roiling clouds, no wind, temp ~72 degrees at 7:00 am. Thunderstorms overnight and to the north. Downpours.

Event 1 - Downpours. I looked at the weather map before my walk and it looked like the storms would miss Stephenville. I was wrong. I got about 2/3 of the first leg of the walk when an absolute downpour hit. I was soaked in seconds. I decided to carry on as I was already waterlogged, and I thought the heavy rain would stop. Which it did. Until I reached as far away from when car as I usually get. Then the downpour recommenced. I trudged back about 1.75 miles to the park, whereupon the rain stopped. I went into the coffee shop looking like a drowned rat and bought a coffee. I walked towards my bench by the river, and it started raining again. So, I decided not to do the south loop. I went instead to the amphitheater in the park (it has a roof) and drank my hot coffee. That was pretty enjoyable all things considered.

Although I got very, very, wet I did learn some things about birds.

Bird lesson 1 - Birds are not stupid. They don’t go out in the rain. So, todays bird count is low in both type and number. I saw most of the birds in the bird counts before the deluge hit.

Bird lesson 2 - When the rain stopped a certain type of bird instantly appeared; flying bug eaters. The rain must have caused flying bugs to launch into the sky. I saw three bird types darting through the sky after the bugs when the rain stopped; Scissortail Flycatchers, Mississippi Kites, and Nighthawks. Most other birds still didn’t appear.

Event 1 - Nighthawks - when I went to get coffee I saw three Nighthawks chasing bugs through the sky. This was a 100% positive identification. I’ve only seen Nighthawks once before. However, they must be all around for them to appear so quickly. They are a night bird but the dark thunderstorms and the numerous bugs must have brought them out. The three Nighthawks flew as a group although individually they flew different paths.

Event 2 - Black Belly Whistling Ducks - Six of these ducks landed on one branch of a tree near the pedestrian bridge over the Bosque River. I got a picture of the six of them. Unfortunately, the lighting was bad so you can only see them in silhouette. The jostled each other quite a bit. Two flew off after a brief period of time, but the other four stayed.

Types - 12 Numbers - 59

Number ‍ ‍Type

18 House Sparrows

14 Grackles

7 Black Belly Whistling Ducks

7 Mississippi Kites

3 Nighthawks

2 Scissortail Flycatchers

2 Hawks - one Red Shouldered Hawk - one type unknown

2 Western Kingbirds

1 Robin

1 White Winged Dove

1 Mockingbird

1 Downy Woodpecker