Shorebird, Matagorda, TX (2 Viewers)

[PonyGirl]

While fishing on Matagorda yesterday we saw this bird. He seemed to be flying ok but stayed just ahead of us. Once we stopped the truck he settled into the seaweed and let us get fairly close, seemed tired or ill and wanted to rest. This picture doesn't show his color well, his beak was more of a blue color. This is not like any bird we have seen in this area.

Thanks for the help,
Ginny

 

[Andrew Whitehouse]

Welcome to BirdForum. Your bird appears to be a Masked Booby, which I think is fairly notable in your area.

 

[Microtus]

Welcome to BirdForum, PonyGirl! You photographed a Masked Booby.

Masked Booby is an "ncommon to rare migrant and nonbreeding summer resident and rare to very rare along the immediate coast." Source: The Texas Ornithological Society Handbook of Texas Birds, Lockwood and Freeman, 2004. That book goes on to say that boobies found on shore frequently are injured or are sick.

 

[Valéry Schollaert]

Good bird indeed, and welcome to BF!

 

[PonyGirl]

Thank you all for the good information and so quickly too! Matagorda is a rather remote barrier island in the central Texas coastline. It looks like I was a bit off base calling it a shorebird ooops .

We often see a wide variety of birds but this one really surprised us. We may have seen one similar quite a few years back.

We were wondering if the excessive seaweed blowing in had anything to do with its appearance. (Looks like we may be in for a bad seaweed problem this year.)

Thanks again and I am enjoying browsing the site. Its awesome.
Ginny