Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of July 13

By Susan Heath Alan, Taylor, Morgan and I headed out to West Galveston Bay last Wednesday for a last check of the oystercatchers. It was pretty calm so we headed towards Swan Lake. On the way out the Tiki Channel we found E0A & C2A the pair that tried nesting on a tiny island along the channel last year. They … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of July 6

By Susan Heath Well it is a covid world unfortunately. We were unable to go out last week because of a covid scare. All turned out negative however thank goodness so we were back in business this week. I went out to West Galveston Bay on Wednesday with Alan Wilde to check on the remaining chicks and see what the … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of June 22

By Susan Heath This week we had to move our survey to Tuesday morning because of rainstorms predicted Wednesday and Thursday and high wind on Friday. The hourly weather from The Weather Channel showed a nice window of time with low chances of rain on Tuesday morning but the local weather on the television showed rain. What to do? Well … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of June 15

By Susan Heath On my trip to West Galveston Bay this week I was joined by Alan Wilde, Maureen Wilde, and Lynn Wright all master naturalists and residents of Tiki Island that watch over the oystercatchers. We started in Jones Bay and found that W5 & JC were flying around FR’s territory. Uh oh. Good thing FR wasn’t there! But … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of June 8

By Susan Heath Taylor, Morgan, and I went out to Bastrop and Drum Bays to check and see if there was any action there early in the week. I had hoped to see JK’s chick again (W7W) but the whole family was gone. The tide was high and they were probably on the beach. The only oystercatchers we saw in … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of June 1

By Susan Heath I had an online meeting scheduled for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons last week so we had to change our schedule around. There was a set of triplets that needed to be banded and I was afraid to wait until Friday lest they fledge so on Monday I went to West Galveston Bay with Alan, Taylor, and … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of May 25

By Susan Heath Well, I forgot to do the blog over the weekend! I guess I got so used to not doing during the quarantine that I have to get back in the habit. Sorry about that! Because of the Memorial Day holiday last week I only made it out to the West Galveston Bay field site but there was … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of May 18

By Susan Heath It’s been a while since we chatted about oystercatchers and I’m happy to be back! As Nora O’Donnell says on the CBS evening news – there’s a lot of news to get to tonight! This week we visited all our field sites to see what’s been happening. On Tuesday I went to East Matagorda Bay with GCBO … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of March 23

By Susan Heath On Monday, Taylor Bennett (GCBO Shorebird biologist) and Morgan Barnes (GCBO intern) went with me to East Matagorda Bay. They closed the beaches in Matagorda County so we thought we might have to use an alternate boat ramp because the one we normally use is on the beach road. Fortunately we could still get to it so … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of March 16

By Susan Heath This week Alan and I were joined by Leslie Goodman and her son Travis Ly to survey West Galveston Bay. Travis is interested in a career in wildlife biology and I’m all about giving kids a taste of what it’s like! It was windy and that caused some issues with the boat but we made it work. … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of March 9

By Susan Heath   If I could put another title on this week’s addition it would be “Things are starting to get interesting”. On Monday I was accompanied by Amanda Hackney (Blackcat GIS) for the first trip of the season to East Matagorda Bay. In years past the birds out there have started nesting later than the ones in West … Read More

Oystercatcher Diaries 2020: Week of March 2

By Susan Heath It wasn’t pretty but we made it out to monitor the oystercatchers this week. We were supposed to go on Wednesday but there was a high chance of rain so I postponed til Friday. After seeing what the weather actually was on Wednesday it was clear we could have gone that day but you just never know. … Read More