I ran into a lady while birding at Almaden Lake Park on January 19th and she told me all about the San Luis and Merced National Wildlife Refuges just beyond Los Banos. On Friday February 16th my wife and I drove out to San Luis where I saw my first Snow Goose of the year, and while driving a road trail we saw a Ring-necked Pheasant. But San Luis was very dry and the 'lake' outside the visitor center a dry bed of grass and reeds. San Luis was a little disappointing but we did see some Tule Elk.
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| Tule Elk |
We then made our way to Merced, the jewel in the crown, to see thousands of Sand Hill Cranes and both Snow and Ross's Geese. We stayed until dusk when many birds were coming in for the night. We had seen this kind of thing once before with cranes at the Bosque del Apache, but this was better with large numbers of these three species, and also many ducks, pelicans and snipe. The only disappointment was my failure to find any Tundra Swans which had been seen at both places the week before.
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| Greater White-fronted Geese |
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| Ross's and Snow Geese |
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| Sandhill Cranes |
A real bonus at Merced was a Great Horned Owl on a telephone pole in bright sunshine as we drove a road trail there.
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| Great-horned Owl |
On Saturday February 17th we headed home via the main street in Los Banos where Cattle Egrets have a favorite spot.
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