Birding Tour Partnerships

Houston Audubon is partnering with professional birding tour companies to offer leisure birding trips. The trips are designed to be about one week long at one or two locations. The birding would be relaxed, with an emphasis on seeing birds that are common and mostly easy to find and will not include early morning starts or strenuous hikes to see the birds. The goal on these trips is not to find as many birds as possible, but to provide trips for either new or less intense birders and younger or still employed birders, who cannot take extended or very expensive trips.

The birding tour companies will provide all the logistical and administrative operations as well as the guides. This provides the participants with high-quality professional bird guides and support to make these trips both rewarding and enjoyable. The companies donate a portion of the tour fee to Houston Audubon.

Arizona Hummingbirds with High Lonesome Birdtours

August 12-19, 2023

Arizona boasts the third-highest total of bird species by state in the United States, pretty impressive for being completely landlocked. In particular, the southeast corner holds the highest diversity due to the confluence of eastern and western species; and many southern species that just spill over the international border here. Southeast Arizona is a land of contrasts, where rugged, forested mountains form “sky islands” within the Sonoran Desert. Rivers, like the Santa Cruz and San Pedro, flow slowly across arid valleys, creating ribbons of greenery along their banks by supporting cottonwoods and willows. Middle elevations are covered by rich grasslands and juniper-oak woodland while the highest elevations harbor mixed coniferous forests. In between, one finds desert areas dominated by impressive saguaro cacti, dense mesquite thickets, man-made wetlands that are magnets for water birds, and ancient stands of sycamores along creeks and canyons. This variety of habitats packed into a relatively small area is home to the greatest diversity of breeding birds in the United States. Many species from further south reach their range limits in southeastern Arizona and occur nowhere else in the country. This tour will focus on these southeast Arizona specialties, including up to 13 species of hummingbirds, southwest desert birds, and the spectacular variety of nocturnal birds that can be found here.