Category: Kathy’s blog
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The Black Skimmer
by M. Kathy Raines A slowly curving line, like the groove of an ice skate, invisibly traced the nighttime resaca. A glance upwards revealed the artist—a strange night bird, its massive lower beak slicing through surface waters. This handsome, distinguished fellow was a black skimmer, the only skimmer in our hemisphere and one of three…
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The Rose-Breasted Grosbeak, our Beautiful Guest
by M. Kathy Raines The striking bird—its white chest seemingly splattered with crimson paint—hopped about with his female companion in the grass at the South Padre Island Convention Center last April, eating its fill, undaunted by ardent photographers. These rose-breasted grosbeaks, fatigued and famished, stop off here in April and early May to rest and…
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Laguna Fiddler Crabs
Fiddler crabs are small, their carapaces, or shells, rarely over two inches in diameter. Only the male fiddler bears an oversized cheleped, or claw-bearing limb, which it waves to attract mates and defend turf.
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The Portuguese Man-of-War: a Beautiful, Venomous Colony
A Portuguese Man-of-War (Physalia physalis), also dubbed “bluebottle,” is not a jellyfish. Rather, it is a siphonophore, a colony of same-sexed organisms, called polyps or zooids, working cooperatively as one.
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The Rio Grande Ground Squirrel
The ever-vigilant Rio Grande ground squirrel, like a rabbit or mouse, faces the daily trial of feeding itself but not becoming dinner. A coyote or hawk is no more frightening than I.
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Harris’s Hawks—Guardians of the Grasslands
Like no-nonsense lifeguards perched along a shoreline, Harris’s hawks scrutinize grasslands from multi-tiered poles and brush piles along the Brownsville Historic Battlefield Trail of an evening—sometimes two or three raptors to a pole.