Birding by Airboat - Noisy, Windy & Cold, but so Rewarding!

By Mary Keith, Tampa Audubon Board Member and Audubon Florida Board Member

Mary Keith led volunteers from Tampa Audubon to join the Pasco County Christmas Bird Count Dec. 15. Part of the Tampa Audubon sector included Heartwood Preserve, where we counted birds for several hours. The exciting part was a survey - by airboat - of Werner-Boyce Salt Springs State Park on the Gulf of Mexico.

I was asked what’s it like to bird by airboat. It is NOISY! That big V-8 engine behind you roars.  You wear noise-cancelling earphones, which makes it dicey to communicate with the other birders and the pilot. Hand signals are important.

When he turns the motor off, your ears will still ring for several minutes, along with the ticking of the cooling engine for a bit. Then it is the silence of marshes or the gulf waters, and the calling birds and splish-splash of little waves on the boat. After several minutes of silence, you play the tapes and hope a rail or a sparrow calls back.  Repeat several times, then move to the next spot.

It is WINDY! You’ll get windburn on your face for sure. Glasses are a must to protect your eyes. It can be FRIGID if the weather is cold.  A wind-breaker jacket is a must. It can be bumpy if you’re skimming over waves, or smooth if you’re sliding over calm water.

And it is EXHILARATING! An airboat can take you into back corners of the marsh where even a kayak wouldn’t get you. And sitting high on the airboat gives you a vantage point to look over and through the flocks of birds before you get close enough to scare them off. When you round a corner in the boat trail and a Black Rail flies across the bow of the boat, you gasp, then it’s high-fives!  

The rangers at Werner-Boyce Salt Springs State Park have taken us out for at least 5 years, searching the salt marshes for Black Rails. We’ve seen and heard them several times. This past week the water was very low, so we couldn’t get into all the back creeks we usually visit. But we rounded a corner into a lagoon and over 80 Wood Storks plus hundreds of ibis and egrets lifted off like a huge white cloud. Sand spits into the Gulf held shorebirds galore, plus gulls and terns. 

It’s a different way to bird and a different way to move through their habitat. If you have the chance, be prepared, but take the chance!