DUNCANVILLE, TEXAS — Saturday, Jason Pike and I took part in the 14th annual Caddo Lake Warm-up Winter Bird Count, a joint effort of the Northeast Texas Field Ornithologists and the Shreveport-based Bird Study Group. The count is always held on the first Saturday of December, so it isn’t a Christmas Bird Count, but it is conducted in the same way, with teams birding territories inside a 15-mile circle.

This circle straddles the Texas-Louisiana border and surrounds Caddo Lake. Caddo is the only naturally formed lake in the entire state of Texas, but it has been dammed and regulated by humans for the last century or so. It’s a beautiful and eerie maze of sloughs, bayous, bald cypress swamps, and marshes in the heart of the Piney Woods forests. This is the sixth year that Jason and I have done the count together (2001-05, 2007).

Most of the area Jason and I cover is wooded, so we struggle to find open-country species like Red-tailed Hawk, American Kestrel, and meadowlarks. This year, we found two red-tails and a Loggerhead Shrike, but we missed kestrels and meadowlarks. The area is also very rural. I don’t recall ever seeing a House Sparrow on our route, and the 12 starlings that we saw this year were more than we usually get — we’ve missed them entirely some years.

We also have very little open water, so we rarely get many waterfowl. This year we had 20 Wood Ducks, two Mallards, and 50 flyover Snow Geese (which was actually a good find). We couldn’t find a coot to save our lives.

Here’s what Caddo Lake looks like on a map:

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But here’s what it looks like in reality:

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You can see that there is very little open water on the Texas side of the lake; it’s mostly swamp.

Sadly, the complex Caddo ecosystem is vulnerable and deteriorating. One of many concerns is invasive exotics like water hyacinth, giant salvinia, and nutrias. It’s not a new story, really. The Caddo Indians who inhabited these lands were driven out long ago by invaders from far away. A few of their descendants still survive in Oklahoma, but their language — the language from which the word “Texas” is derived — is almost extinct.

There is a joy and comfort in getting to know a place and its birds — in expecting a Winter Wren on a certain stretch of road (yes, again), Inca Doves in Karnack (none) or Uncertain (three), Savannah Sparrows at the corner (yes) and chippies in the field (never fails). And of course, there are often surprises too — a woodcock sitting out in the sun, a very late Snowy Egret, or hundreds of Rusty Blackbirds flocking at dusk. This year, there were no woodcocks, snowies, or rusties, but we did have an Osprey overhead at the state park. Ospreys have been recorded on seven of the 14 counts so far. But we did even better than that — we found a bird that was not only new for the count but even for the Caddo Lake bird list:

DUNCANVILLE, TEXAS — Brian, in town for a few weeks before returning to England, wanted to see North American pitcher plants. “Aha!” I thought. “The Big Thicket.” So we went this weekend. I knew the pitcher plants would be easy to find, but I was hoping for some birds for myself: Swainson’s Warblers, Swallow-tailed Kites, and maybe even a Bachman’s Sparrow.

Friday morning, we started early at Birdwatcher’s Trail in the Menard Creek Unit of Big Thicket National Preserve. We had barely opened the car doors before the mosquitoes descended, sending us scrambling for repellent. I quickly decided the trail might be more accurately named “Birdlistener’s Trail.” I heard Summer Tanagers, Acadian Flycatchers, Red-eyed and Yellow-throated vireos, and cardinals, but I saw only the huge spiders who’d spun their webs across the trail. Despite my best efforts to appreciate them, they evoke involuntary revulsion that I can feel in my stomach.

The trail finally descended into water, which isn’t supposed to happen, but everything is at flood stage right now. We turned back, and Brian spotted a young alligator in Menard Creek. I also saw one Prothonotary Warbler.

We continued to Sundew Trail, where we had to wait for morning rains to lighten up. The trail produced few birds, but I did see some rather tatty Pine Warblers and hear a Brown-headed Nuthatch. Brian, however, fared much better with his plants.

Don’t miss the full gallery of Friday’s Big Thicket pictures.

I hadn’t visited Big Thicket National Preserve since April 2004. This weekend’s trip brought back many memories of that wonderful first trip, when I saw carnivorous plants for the first time, and when I waited by the Sabine River, scanning vultures and Broad-winged Hawks, until one, two, three Swallow-tailed Kites materialized in the sky over Louisiana.

On that trip, I heard Hooded Warblers singing nearly everywhere I went, and I even got to see several of them, as I recall. I missed Red-cockaded Woodpecker and Bachman’s Sparrow, but I did finally get those species later in the same season with Jason and Lynn.

Here is a touched-up excerpt from my notes of three years ago:

The small birds — their songs, their battles, and their love-making — they bring a smile to the forest each spring. But the distant, haunted voice of the Barred Owl echoes a story that not even the elf-kissed Wood Thrush could tell. The cowled mystic spoke of things so ancient, so beautiful, that the forest wanted to weep. None remember these things now save the jewelwings, who will flit by the streams and sloughs till the world is unmade.

I made a gallery with more photos from the 2004 Big Thicket trip.

PORT ARTHUR, TEXAS — Well, Jason and Cinny are married. Jason (formerly of the Blurry-eyed Birder blog and now of BroChaplain) was my first Texan friend. We started birding together in 2000 with a White-eyed Vireo at Caddo Lake.

Now, I’m down here on the Gulf Coast — without Jason for the first time. After the wedding, I drove from Henderson to Port Arthur, stopping briefly in Zavalla before daylight failed completely. I picked up Pine Warbler, Northern Parula, Common Nighthawk, Purple Martin, and Orchard Oriole for my trip list. I’m going for 150 species over the long weekend, but that may be a bit overambitious. I couldn’t find Brown-headed Nuthatch and some of the other Pineywoods specialties, which didn’t help my chances.

But on the other hand, some startling birds are being reported from this corner of the state, so we’ll see what tomorrow holds.

HENDERSON, TEXAS — Common Grackles are squawking outside. Inside, we’re putting on our suits. Jason, my erstwhile college birding accomplice, is getting married in a few hours. It’s just one more sign of spring.

Yesterday, Rose-breasted Grosbeaks, Yellow-throated Vireos, Painted Buntings, and Scissor-tailed Flycatchers performed along 254 before the rehearsal.

Now, I’d better go see about that suit.

DUNCANVILLE, TEXAS — It is difficult to express how completely the world changes between Dallas and Tyler. Towering pines, rich in color and scent, contrast with gnarled mesquite and thorns. The change in bird life is more subtle but just as real.

I heard Pine Warblers trilling in the trees just east of Tyler, and with more time or better luck I could have had Brown-headed Nuthatches too. Great-tailed Grackles, on the other hand, were absent from the parking lots in town.

I spent the afternoon with Jason, my college birding confrere, and his family. Late in the day, I headed west again and discovered that the winds had altered the sky.