Nature Along the El Camino Real

Encounter with a Black Witch

October 8, 2025 Sue Ann (Suna) Kendall1 Comment

by Eric Neubauer

I recently got back from the TX/NM border region including Monahans Sandhills State Park. Not great timing for wolf spiders because only a few species were in or nearing their breeding season, but I was still able to add two species to my life list. There were other compensations:

Ascalapha odorata (Black Witch) is a huge moth. I had seen a couple of very worn ones in a dark alcove at Devils River last fall where they couldn’t be readily photographed. As I made my way down into a sand dune blowout, I flushed one that flew around for a while before settling down about 5′ away. Unbelievably it let me approach quite close. The photos were amazing and were a credit to the Olympus camera. Light levels were very low and the setting sun had already left most of the
blowout in shadow.

Not far away was a Euploca convolvulacea (Phlox heliotrope) which had only the bare essentials of a mature plant. Many plants were covered with hundreds of bloom.

I’ve known about the Black Witch for decades but never expected to see one, so never looked up the details. The range map on iNat is amazing and includes all of North and South America except the coldest extremes. It has even turned up on Wake Island in the eastern Pacific. It is quite a flier and apparently has some sort of northward migration in the fall.

Mine was in perfect condition, so it must have matured nearby rather than migrating there. There had been 8 previous observations scattered around Ward County, all in good condition suggesting there is a healthy local breeding population there.

Geeking Out over Sound Patterns

September 29, 2025 Sue Ann (Suna) Kendall2 Comments

By Sue Ann Kendall

[I wrote this for my personal blog but accidentally created it on this site, so enjoy my fascination.]

Bear in mind that I have been looking at waveforms most of my adult life, so this stuff interests me. I still edit myself talking a lot (yep, it’s my job), so I know when I’m gasping or clicking from saliva before I even listen. It’s interesting, not that fun.

But it’s only in the past couple of years, since I e had Merlin Bird ID that I’ve been able to identify bird calls by how they look on a spectrogram.

Loggerhead Shrike – you can just tell it’s loud and harsh, not melodic.

This kind of knowledge is helpful in winter when there are so many sparrows around. Their spectrograms look different. Here’s one I also like.

Songbird recordings look very different. Some are more horizontal lines going up or down with the pitch. Others have a mix of tones, but you can see the melody. These two I got from Merlin, of birds I’ve heard.

As I’ve been enjoying the sounds birds, there have been other sounds Merlin catches, like loud trucks, airplanes, and wind. And, of course there are insects. I was being deafened by the sounds of late-summer cicadas when I looked down at the waveforms. Wow!

You can practically feel the pulsing by looking at those fascinating shapes. On the other hand, crickets just stick to one note.

So if anyone ever asks me how I know a sound is a cricket versus a cicada, I can turn on Merlin. It may not ID it, but I can now from the shape.

Here’s a sound I’m glad Merlin heard: a Yellow-headed Blackbird. They only show up here a few days a year during migration. Photo by Dorian Anderson.

I used to have some frog images but I can’t find them. I’ll be paying attention and when I hear something interesting, I’ll stop the recording, since Merlin doesn’t save recordings over about 20 minutes long, due to storage constraints. My phone would be FULL.

Fighting the Invaders in The Mini Wildscape

September 29, 2025September 29, 2025 Sue Ann (Suna) Kendall1 Comment

By Carolyn Henderson

A small but intrepid group took on the fight of the non-native, invasive plants in the Wildscape – again. Chad Cryer, Alan Rudd, Liz Lewis, Phyllis Sheffield, Pamela Neeley and I implemented a new method to attempt to get rid of the seriously invasive persimmons and Tree of Heavens.

I would call it isolated poisoning. Chad clipped the multitude of pomegranate trees, many that had managed to reach at least 5 to 6 feet this season. Alan then put a tree poison only on the cut limbs. We cut them back in February. Alan had already done it to the Tree of Heavens that weren’t as numerous.

We put all the limbs in Alan’s pickup bed. The pile stood taller than the truck cab.

We also fought off the Tievine that had totally covered the Gulf Muhly grass among other things. We also removed the other invasives in the Wildscape. A good deal of what had been planted was there, but scraggly looking from being overshadowed by all of those. It knocked out a few completely.

We vowed to be back in two weeks to evaluate our efforts.

Getting to Work on Our Grant

September 27, 2025September 27, 2025 Sue Ann (Suna) KendallLeave a comment

by Catherine Johnson

On the first cool day of Autumn, progress continued on the H-E-B Pollinators Across Texas Project at the Milam Wildscape Project.

Many native plants are thriving, including Buttonbush trees, host to Sphinx Moths. Barbados Cherry provides nectar, fruit, and seeds. Goldenrod that was provided by Chapter member Eric is ready to bloom.

We saw pollinators and the new residents.

Seeds and more seeds

September 18, 2025 Sue Ann (Suna) KendallLeave a comment

By Linda Burgess

This past Tuesday, the El Camino Real Master Naturalists and the Little River Basin Master Gardeners came together to contribute to a shared volunteer opportunity. We meet the third Tuesday of each month to package native and adapted wildflower seeds, herb and garden seeds, and some landscaping plant seeds…..all for the Free Seed Library located in the Cameron Public Library.

We are sharing stories, getting to know one another, and providing free seeds to the residents of Milam County. It’s become a great opportunity to learn and grow from each other’s expertise….. and there’s a wealth of knowledge in these two organizations!