Chiapas: City Birding

After spending most of our morning time in the park next door and to the east of the motel, we decided to walk along the very busy street to the west.  This street has 3 lanes of traffic in both directions and both sides of the streets lined with big and small businesses including some American businesses such as Sam's Club, McDonald's, Applebees, and others.  There was also a fairly large mall on the opposite side of the street.  Traffic was so heavy, that the only safe way to cross, was to use the overhead walkways that went up and over the street.  Birding was not our main objective on this walk, after all it was hot and humid and we were also hungry.  

As we sat in a restaurant eating, we spent time observing a couple of Social Flycatchers feeding right outside the window.  We also had one that we occasionally saw in the lot of the motel, but I never seemed to have my camera with me.  I have always wondered why did they get the name 'Social' Flycatcher?  Still don't know what led to calling them social; however, I have come up my own with my own reasoning, They are pretty social with humans.  We actually discovered 2 nests of these birds right along this very busy street and they had used the metal crossbars of electrical poles for nesting sights.  One nest had a couple of chicks that were on the verge of fledging and they were very vocal.

 Social Flycatcher

Social Flycatcher - Fledglings

A trip to the mall led us through the double decker parking lot which was being used by Gray-breasted Martins.  We had originally mis-identified this bird, but has now been corrected to the proper species; gray-breasted Martin.

 Gray-breasted Martin

Gray-breasted Martin

Once we returned to the motel I finally got some photos of a couple of Scrub Euphonias that had been hanging around the motel off and on.  Like the Social Flycatcher, I just kept running into bad timing by not having my camera with me at the right time.  This time I finally got a couple of photos.  

 Scrub Euphonia - Male

Scrub Euphonia - Male

Scrub Euphonia - Female

One other bird species that was a new bird for me was the Golden-fronted Woodpecker.  Saw many of them in the park and around the motel, but really struggled to get any decent photos of them.  Had to settle with this being my best photo of this bird.

Golden-fronted Woodpecker

And one last photo of one of the common birds in the city, the Inca Dove.  These birds are also found in Arizona and where I live in Mesa they are quite common and readily visit my back yard feeders.  However in the the Tucson area they are getting tough to find which might be due to the high numbers of Cooper's Hawks in Tucson.

Inca Dove

So what we discovered is that birding in the city can also have some cool and unexpected results.  We have one day left for birding before we embark on our long journey home.