Great egret

Great egret

Populations were decimated by plume hunters in late 1800s, recovered rapidly with protection early in 20th century. In recent decades, breeding range has been expanding gradually northward, while there is some evidence that southern populations have declined.

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Ring-necked duck

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Ring-necked duck The male Ring-necked Duck is a sharply marked bird of gleaming black, gray, and white. Females are rich brown with a delicate face pattern. At distance, look for this species’ distinctive, peaked head to help you identify it. Even though this species dives for its food, you can find it in shallow wetlands such as beaver swamps, ponds, and bays. Of all the diving duck species, the Ring-necked Duck is most likely to drop into small ponds during migration.
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Burrowing owl

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Burrowing owl Owls are unmistakable birds, and that goes double for a long-legged owl that hunts on the ground during the day. Burrowing Owls are small, sandy colored owls with bright-yellow eyes. They live underground in burrows they’ve dug themselves or taken over from a prairie dog, ground squirrel, or tortoise. They live in grasslands, deserts, and other open habitats, where they hunt mainly insects and rodents. Their numbers have declined sharply with human alteration of their habitat and the decline of prairie dogs and ground squirrels.
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Aphelocoma ultramarina

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Aphelocoma ultramarina The Mexican jay is a medium-large (~120 g) passerine similar in size to most other  jays , with a blue head, blue-gray mantle, blue wings and tail, and pale gray breast and underparts. The sexes are morphologically similar, and juveniles differ only in having less blue coloration and, in some populations, a pink/pale (instead of black) bill that progressively becomes more black with age (Brown and Horvath 1989). Some field guides misreport this color as yellow because the pale bill becomes yellow in museum study skins. The iris is brown and legs are black. Mexican Jays range from the north in central Arizona, southwestern New Mexico and west-central Texas through the eastern central mountain chain south to Puebla, Guerrero and central Veracruz and went to Jalisco and Colima. Mexican Jays range from the north in central Arizona, southwestern New Mexico and west-central Texas through the eastern central mountain chain south to Puebla, Guerrero and cent...
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