ML641946292

Observation details

2nd State record, found around 0800 hrs by landowners Micah & Marsha Coleman. Mother Ginger Coleman shared photos taken around noon on FB "Birding Texas!" page, and report was disseminated around with details by 1330 hrs or so. Likely seen by close to 100 birders today (67 ebird lists as of 9/15). Bird was initially in somewhat open area without groundcover under Post Oaks for initial observers, but by the time we arrived at 1639, the bird had moved into dense croton cover, and was barely visible, with views mostly limited to the bird's head, often through vegetation, with only occasional views of the birds neck and scapulars. Bird moved around very little from 1639 until about 1840, when it began to be more active, ultimately flying out into more open grassy area (not flushed!) at 1910 where we were able to obtain clear photos. The only previous Texas record was collected by E.B. Chamberlin & L.R. Wolfe on 5 December 1961 in Kleberg Co on Laureles Division of the King Ranch. This specimen is housed at the Smithsonian with the catalogue number of USNM 478866 (see: Orrell T, Informatics and Data Science Center - Digital Stewardship (2025). NMNH Extant Specimen Records (USNM, US). Version 1.98. National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution. Occurrence dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/hnhrg3 accessed via GBIF.org on 2025-09-15. https://gbif.org/occurrence/1318766346). Per Petra Hockey, a Double-striped Thick-knee was reported near Victoria sometime in the early 2000s, but only seen by the initial observer and not photographed. The bird was not relocated in follow-up searches. No report was submitted to the TBRC (or none can be found) Another Double-striped Thick-knee was photographed in Yuma, Arizona, in November of 1989 - per Arizona Bird Records Committee report this bird was determined to have been translocated from Guatemala - "A somewhat tame individual on a golf course in Yuma, YUM, beginning 16 Nov 1989 was certainly this species but eventually proven to be a bird transplanted from Guatemala (see Rosenberg 1991). " (Rosenberg, G. H. 1991 Double-striped Thick-knee: The final chapter? Letter to editor. Birding 23-118-119.) The nearest records in Mexico to Texas are from Tamaulipas south of Reynosa (25.729451, -98.318973) on 27 Sept 2017 - this location is about 50km south of the Pharr border crossing; and from Nuevo Leon at Rancho El Último Tirón (26.497413, -100.602795) on 30 May 2022 - approximately 155 km SW of Laredo - although the bulk of this species range in Mexico is from central Tamaulipas southward (beginning in the vicinity of Ciudad Victoria and Gomez Farias).