Louisiana – Cameron Parish and Southwest Louisiana

This morning we’ll bird our way southwest to the Gulf Coast, looking for Wilson’s Phalarope, Purple Gallinule, and Black-bellied Whistling-Duck along the way. We will spend the full day birding in Louisiana’s famed marshlands and beaches, concentrating on the expansive Cameron Prairie National Wildlife Refuge. Target species include Neotropic Cormorant, Fulvous Whistling-Duck, Purple Gallinule, and Least Bittern. We will see King Rails, often with black, downy young. On past tours we found a Western Grebe swimming in the Gulf, and a small flock of Black Scoters migrating along the coast.

Overnight: Cameron

Today we’ll drive east to Oak Grove and Grand Chenier to look for Neotropical migrants, Barn Owl, and Least Bittern. Whenever the proper weather conditions prevail, we will abandon our afternoon plans and bird the nearest chenier.

Northerly winds can bring down thousands of Gulf migrants, and the trees may be alive with warblers, vireos, thrushes, tanagers, grosbeaks, and other songbirds. Fallouts such as these have produced first state records including Townsend’s Warbler, Hepatic Tanager, and Hooded Oriole. Let the north winds blow!

Overnight: Cameron

We will spend a full day in coastal refuges including the famed Rockefeller and Cameron-Prairie National Wildlife Refuges. Here we may find Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, Dickcissel, Painted Bunting, and a nice variety of waterfowl. Some time spent scoping rice fields could produce a few Marbled and Hudsonian Godwits, Franklin’s Gull, and many other aquatic species.

We’ll search for Crested Caracara, the northernmost population on the continent. Whenever we have a free hour early or late in the day, East Jetty Beach, just a mile south of Cameron, is excellent for shorebirds, gulls, and terns. Oak groves in and near Cameron can yield interesting songbirds, including White-crowned Sparrow and Summer Tanager.

Overnight: Cameron

This may be a good day to drive into East Texas to visit Sea Rim State Park and Sabine Woods (pronounced suh BEAN’). On a previous tour we planned our visit with the midday arrival of a cold front and a brief, heavy rain. This resulted in the fallout of hundreds of Neotropical migrants: 50 Orchard Orioles, 75 Indigo Buntings, half a dozen Painted Buntings, FOUR Cerulean Warblers, Western Kingbirds, Philadelphia and Yellow-throated Vireos, almost 20 different warblers, and many more wonderful birds. It was quite an afternoon!

Last year we found a roosting Chuck-will’s-widow at Sabine Woods. What a great bird!

Overnight: Cameron

A return to Holly Beach may yield a few seabirds such as a Parasitic Jaeger or Northern Gannet. Rarities in the Holly Beach area during recent spring migrations include Masked Duck, Tropical Kingbird, and Shiny Cowbird, among many others. Sabine Lake and Blue Buck Pond are good for Whimbrel, Long-billed Curlew, and a variety of waterfowl.

By now we should have seen Inca Dove, White-winged Dove, and Eurasian Collared-Dove. Other possibilities include Anhinga, Summer Tanager, and Brown-headed Nuthatch.

We’ll drive north and spend the night in the town of Lake Charles, 40 miles from the coast.

Overnight: Lake Charles

Today’s birding will be an inland loop through Calcasieu and Beauregard Parishes. We’ll look for Mississippi and Swallow-tailed Kites at Niblett’s Bluff, Greater Roadrunner at Old River, and pine forest specialties such as Red-cockaded Woodpecker, Bachman’s Sparrow, Pine Warbler, and Brown-headed Nuthatch in Kisatchie National Forest. The river bottoms may yield Barred Owl, Red-headed Woodpecker, and Swainson’s and Prothonotary Warblers.

Overnight: Lake Charles

Our final morning will be open for anything we want to do. If we missed Red-cockaded Woodpecker yesterday, there will be more time to look for it this morning. If our target species cooperated, then another search of the rice fields may yield an unusual shorebird such as a Curlew Sandpiper or Ruff.

We will spend several hours at a turf farm, landfill, and adjacent back roads to look for Crested Caracara, Swainson’s Hawk, Yellow-headed Blackbird, Scissor-tailed Flycatcher, and Buff-breasted and Upland Sandpipers. We found a Lark Sparrow here last year, quite unusual for this region.

After lunch we’ll drive to Lafayette Airport, where this fantastic tour ends. Or, hopefully you will join me on the drive to Mobile and on to the Dauphin Island, Alabama Tour. That drive last year produced a large flock of Sandhill Cranes, a Red-headed Woodpecker, and an adult Bald Eagle!

YES! – Assuming that everyone’s flight arrives before dark. One of our first targets is only a few minutes from from the airport.

Check the weather for the destination as close to your departure date as possible, and dress accordingly for your comfort level. You can also review our What to Bring page for more information.

There are many items the will be useful to you while on a Bird Treks tour. We have put together our list of recommendations on the What to Bring page.

Our tours are all conducted in English, but we do have some experience working with client that don’t speak English well – Some English would be needed for safety reasons. In locations where another language is predominately spoken, a native guide may accompany the tour.

Yes, we will always try our best to help with anything at all! We’re here to serve you. However, it is usually easier if you book your flight through your own travel agent as we can’t always get the best deals from your particular country. But we will help whenever needed!

While Day 1 is usually a travel (arrival) day, and the last day of the tour is usually also a travel day (departure), many people do like to arrive early and/or leave late. We can indeed book extra nights before and after the trip, and we in fact recommend you let us book them, as it avoids confusion and allows us to book the accommodation that is most convenient for the tour.

NOTE: Most often it is the same hotel or lodge that you use on the first night of the tour, but in some instances, it could be an airport hotel or an accommodation establishment where the guide is staying.

No, we do not. We find that it is better for trip participants to purchase their own medical, trip cancellation, and baggage insurance through their own insurance provider in the country they reside in. We expect all tour participants to have comprehensive insurance, and we encourage everyone to send us a copy of their insurance documents.

For most tours, meals are included in the tour price. This may include a hotel-provided breakfast, or guide-provided box lunches. For dinners, we strive to find interesting and delicious local restaurants – this allows us to give back to the local economy, and find exciting new place to eat.