With more than 600 species, few states can hold a candle to Texas when it comes to birding.
The Great Texas Coastal Birding Trail, for example, runs along the Texas coastline from Beaumont in the northeast down to the Rio Grande Valley.
Corpus Christi, home to 243 species of birds, was named "America's Birdiest City" last year, a title it has held annually since 2003. And Laredo, the only place in the U.S. to boast four species of kingfisher, has its annual Laredo Birding Festival in February.
South Texas features the World Birding Center (WBC) (www.theworldbirdingcenter.com), a network of nine birding sites. The locations begin in the east at South Padre Island and run 120 miles inland to Roma in the west, covering more than 10,000 acres of land and offering a variety of habitats.
A joint partnership between Rio Grande Valley communities, the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, the World Birding Center offers opportunities for meeting and convention groups.
The newest of the nine member locations is the South Padre Island Birding and Nature Center, which opened in September 2009. Adjacent to the island's convention center, the $6.5 million nature and birding center has exhibits, a gift shop, a five-story observation tower and a boardwalk that links with the boardwalk at the destination's convention facility.
With a capacity for 500, the entire building can be rented for functions. Other spaces include a boardroom seating 30, an auditorium seating 100 and an exhibit hall with a reception capacity for 100.
McAllen features Quinta Mazatlan, a 20-acre, city-operated facility that encompasses nature trails, gardens and a mansion built in the 1930s. The home caters to groups of up 300. Meeting space at the WBC site includes lawns, an amphitheater, a courtyard, a grand hall and an art gallery.
Meanwhile, three Texas state parks that are part of the WBC network each have meeting space. The options include the 1,200-acre Resaca de la Palma outside Brownsville, which features a visitors center, over six miles of trails, four observation decks and a 3.2-mile tram loop; the 760-acre Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park in Mission, which is the headquarters for the WBC and has tram service, four nature trails, observation towers and decks; and the 230-acre Estero Llano Grande in Weslaco, which features the largest wetlands in the center's system and more than three miles of trails.
The other four WBC sites are the 40-acre Edinburg Scenic Wetlands, located within a city park in Edinburg; Harlingen's Arroyo Colorado, a wooded urban retreat connected by waterway; the Old Hidalgo Pumphouse, a pumphouse and agricultural museum on the Rio Grande in Hidalgo; and Roma Bluffs, the plaza of an old steamboat port and riverside nature area.
