These photos were all taken in Central Texas on May 6, 2015.

This first bird is a Gray catbird which unfortunately didn’t stick around long enough for me to obtain a good photo.  This is only the second one I ever remember seeing.  

This is apparently a female Common yellowthroat, a difficult identification that my sister made after looking through Sibley at all the female warblers.  Although there is no major body of water nearby, this bird was foraging through a young yaupon thicket just above the ground… much as it would be doing on the edge of a marsh.

While I’m on the subject of warblers, here’s another photo of a male Black-throated Green warbler approaching a bird bath.

These next two birds are some of the chief alerters for the presence of an owl or snake.

This Black-crested titmouse is the more numerous of the titmouse species occurring on my sister’s property.  The other species is the Tufted titmouse and the two species sometimes hybridize.  I never saw a Tufted titmouse during my visit.

This next bird is a Carolina chickadee, very similar to our Black-capped chickadee.  The easiest way to tell the two birds apart?  Their ranges don’t overlap!

This photo is of a male Ladder-backed woodpecker, although it doesn’t show the feature for which the bird is named.

And finally, perhaps saving the best for last, a male Summer tanager in full breeding plumage.  A  first-year male, which has very interesting coloration, was shown in a prior post.