Passport to Texas

Billy Hassell’s Powderhorn Ranch

Billy Hassell and the Art of Conservation Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

Billy Hassell lives in the urban world of Fort Worth; yet, he’s always been drawn to the natural world.

Reconnecting with nature in a small way, in a very urban environment… it calms the soul somehow if you can slow down. We live fast-paced lives and we’re kind of conditioned, I think, to believe we have to live in rush all the time.

He doesn’t rush, but he does brush. Billy’s a full-time artist who focuses on nature.

My work has always been inspired by nature. I grew up in a time when there were still some open spaces and creeks and I got to experience a little bit of nature even though I grew up in a pretty urban environment. I guess my love of nature was born from those experiences, and I’ve been kind of searching for that throughout the rest of my life. I’ve been seeking out opportunities to be out in nature and find places to inspire my work.

And inspiration is all around. He recently found it at Powderhorn Ranch.

I find a lot of inspiration as an artist in a place like this, and as I learn more and more about it, I’m fascinated by the complexities of it and how practically every plant and every little creature plays a role in the overall balance of a place.

See Billy Hassell and his art in a segment of the Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series on PBS the week of June 16. Check your local listings.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Gulf oysters in repose.

TPW TV-- The Oyster Grind Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

Texas reefs once held what seemed like an endless supply of oysters. But times have changed. Over the years the daily sack limits have been cut back.

It used to be a hundred and fifty sack a day.

Mauricio Blanco has been an oysterman in Lavaca Bay for 30 years.

Now it’s went down from one hundred and fifty sacks to ninety sacks, and then from ninety sacks, they went down to fifty sacks; this year the state limit is thirty sacks. So, every year we getting less, and less, and less. And the bad part is that fuel, it don’t go down, it goes up and up. But like right now, we probably going to make twenty sacks all day long. Maybe.

In a Texas Parks and Wildlife TV segment that airs the week of May 26, viewers visit the coast where a section of Galveston Bay receives much-needed TLC in the form of new reef bottom. Bill Rodney is a Natural Resource specialist with Texas Parks and Wildlife.

Recent science has indicated that most oyster reefs are operating right on the border of sustainability. Everybody realizes that something needs to be done. The key to restoring the habitat is putting fresh cultch out there, cultch can be any materials that oysters can grow on.

Witness the rebirth of an oyster reef and the measures taken to ensure the success of the resource and those who depend on it…on the Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series, the week of May 26 on PBS. Check your local listings.

The Sport Fish Restoration Program supports our series.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife, I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Xochitl Rodriguez and Adrian Sabom.

TPW TV-- Natural Connection Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

The outdoors brings people together, as it did Xochit Rodriguez and Adrian Sabom. Xochit grew up in El Paso; the Franklin Mountains were her backyard. Adrien grew up hunting on her family’s south Texas Ranch.

[Xochitl Rodriguez] Adrian and I met at a Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation event.
[Adrian Sabom] I met Xochitl at the We Will Not Be Tamed campaign launch party, and we were talking about, well she has never shot a gun and I had never hiked the Franklin Mountains, and so it evolved into, we should each do each other’s thing.

Each woman visited the other on her home turf. Xochit ‘s visit to Adrian’s ranch started with a horseback ride.

[Adrian Sabom] After horseback riding, we went to the big event…
[Xochitl Rodriguez] The moment we’ve all been waiting for.
[Adrian Sabom] Xochit shooting a gun for the first time.
[Xochitl Rodriguez] This is the craziest thing I’ve ever done. I was really, really scared.
[Adrian Sabom] She was super nervous in the beginning. You could tell her hands were shaking, she was sweating.
[Xochitl Rodriguez] I shook after every clay, but then I finally got into the groove and felt a little bit better.

Share the full experience of both women when you tune into the Texas Parks and Wildlife TV show on PBS the week of May 12.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife, I’m Cecilia Nasti.

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Green Jay

TPW TV--Green Jay Study in Rio Grande Valley Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

A new study in South Texas focuses on the Green Jay.

We don’t know a lot about green jays, first of all, so it’s important to know what they’re doing, if we want to be able to manage for them, and we want to manage for them because we have a lot of birdwatchers that come into the Valley and one of the species that they really want to see are green jays.

Tony Henehan is a Wildlife Biologist with Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. The Green Jay occurs from South America, north to Texas.

The Rio Grande Valley is, I think, the third fastest growing urban area in the country. It’s expanding at a rapid rate. A lot of urbanization, a lot of habitat change is going on, and so these birds have been able to adapt to a certain extent.

To understand how Green Jays are adapting to the rapidly changing environment of The Valley, Tony plans to trap, tag and track up to ten birds a year. RGV resident, Donna McCowan let Tony place a trap in her backyard.

Well, Tony brought this cage to me about a week and a half ago and had me set it up here under the shade. With the cage door open we were putting corn and peanuts in it, so the birds would get used to it and just assume it’s supposed to be there, and they had no problem with getting in and out of it. This morning, we’re going close the top of it and watch and wait for the birds to show up.

Find out if Tony and Donna trapped a Green Jay when you watch the Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series on PBS the week of April 14.

The Wildlife Restoration Program Supports our Series.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

TPW TV--Blanco River Recovery Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

When a forty-foot wall of water thundered down the Blanco River on Memorial Day weekend of 2015, it claimed 13 lives, destroyed hundreds of homes, and ravaged the land along the banks. The recovery process for humans and nature continues.

The flood of 2015 caused massive devastation to the Blanco River landscape, there was a loss of a lot of vegetation, a lot of trees, a lot of soil scour, and what we see here is an eco-system in recovery.

Ryan McGillicuddy is a Texas Parks and Wildlife conservation ecologist with Inland Fisheries.

Healthy native stream-side vegetation provides a number of ecological functions including bank stability, because its roots are deep and strong.  It also provides a water quality function by filtering run-off and pollutants, but also, importantly, this healthy stream-side vegetation is also an extreme benefit to our fish and wildlife populations.

Healthy stream-side vegetation benefits our fish and wildlife populations, including the Guadalupe Bass. At one time this fish had been pushed completely out of the Blanco River system by non-native small mouth bass. But through management and restocking, it’s rebounding.

We’ve been able to document that the fish that we’ve stocked are now reproducing in the wild, so it’s been a pretty remarkable success story.

Experience the story of the recovery of a community, a river and wildlife on the Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series the week of March 10 on PBS.

The Sport Fish Restoration Program supports our series.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.