ca. 1992

ERIK BREDEN takes all the pictures used for our products, prepares the images for printing and for display on on our web site, and also creates and maintains all of the web pages on our web site. He started taking general nature pictures as a teenager (see photo at right). His subjects included insects, frogs, turtles, snakes, mammals...well, actually, anything that would stay still long enough to be photographed! A frustrating attempt to photograph a Baltimore Oriole in a large willow tree in his parents backyard was the catalyst that ignited his passion for birds, and started him on a lifelong quest to photograph birds.

ca. 1967

Erik has photographed over 890 species of North American, Central/South American, European, and Asian birds (over 650 in North America alone!). A number of these have been published as documentary photographs in:

• New Jersey Audubon's Records of New Jersey Birds,
  
  
• the American Birding Association's Winging It and North American Birds (formerly known as National Audubon Society Field Notes, formerly known as American Birds),
  
  
• the British birdwatcher's magazine Birdwatch,
  
  
• and the Texas Ornithological Society's Texas Birds Annual and Bulletin of the Texas Ornithological Society,

Erik provided slides to David Sibley for use in the preparation of the highly acclaimed Sibley Guide to Birds (David Allen Sibley, 2000).

He also contributed slides that are on file with VIREO (Visual Resources for Ornithology) at the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences, and has donated slides for use in presentations at the Cape May Bird Observatory.

In addition, his photographs can be seen in the following photographic field guides:

• The Sparrows of the United Sates and Canada - The Photographic Guide - James D. Rising, 2001
  
  
• Shorebirds of North America - The Photographic Guide - Dennis Paulson, 2005
  
  
• Identifying Warblers of the Upper Texas Coast (computer-based presentation and study guide) - Don Richardson, Houston Audubon Society, 2005

On previous birding trips to Texas, and since THE OTTER SIDE moved to Texas in 1999, he has been documenting rarities for the TBRC (Texas Bird Records Committee). You can see photographs of many of these birds at the TBRC Website:

• a male Blue Bunting at Bentsen Rio Grande Valley State Park in January 1988
• a pair of Hook-billed Kites at Santa Ana NWR in January 1989
• the Rufous-backed Robin at the Sarita Courthouse in February 2000
• the resident White-collared Seedeaters at San Ygnacio in April 2000
• a Black-whiskered Vireo at the Quintana Neotropical Bird Reserve, Quintana Beach in May 2000
• a Buff-breasted Flycatcher at The Nature Conservancy's Davis Mountains Preserve in June 2000
• the amazing Yellow-billed Loon which spent the winter of 2000-2001 in the Laguna Madre (the bay side of South Padre Island)
• the first Reddish Egret for the Texas Hill Country along the Guadalupe River, Kerrville in August 2001
• the Gyrfalcon in Lubbock in February 2002 (the southernmost Gyrfalcon record for North America!)
• the unprecedented influx of Mexican birds into the Rio Grande Valley in the winter of 2004-2005 (including White-throated Thrush, Crimson-collared Grosbeak, and the first [fully documented] Texas and United States record of Social Flycatcher!)
• the [formerly] reliable Brown Jays at the DeWind's feeders in Salineno
• the Green-breasted Mango which stayed in the backyard of a McAllen neighborhood home over the winter of 2004-2005
• the male King Eider at Port Bolivar in April 2005 (only the 2nd Texas record!)
• the very cooperative Fork-tailed Flycatcher at Hornsby Bend, Austin in October 2005
• an American Flamingo which wandered from its Yucatan Peninsula home to Aransas NWR in the late winter and early spring of 2006
• the elusive Sulphur-bellied Flycatcher which was present at the Texas Ornithological Society's Sabine Woods Sanctuary for a few days in April 2006
• the very cooperative Northern Jacana at the Estero Llano Grande unit of the World Birding Center in Weslaco in August 2006
• a new Spring record for the upper Texas coast in late April 2007 - a Green-breasted Mango at the Texas Ornithological Society's Sabine Woods Sanctuary!
• a surprising "Black" Brant in the beginning of November, 2007 in Andrews, Texas (only the 23rd Texas record!)
• a cooperative Golden-crowned Sparrow on the 2007 Robert Lee Christmas Bird Count (only the 29th Texas record!)
• an Allen's Hummingbird which spent the winter of 2007-2008 at a private residence in Northwest Houston
• a Dusky-capped Flycatcher which spent the winter of 2007-2008 at National Audubon's Sabal Palms Sanctuary in Brownsville
• the amazing first North American Record of White-crested Elaenia (normally found only in South America from Chile to Ecuador!) which spent two days at the Valley Land Fund's West Sheepshead Street vacant lots in South Padre Island in mid-February 2008. This bird's photo made the cover of the Winter 2008 edition of North American Birds!
• a female Blue Bunting at Bentsen Rio Grande Valley State Park in January 2009

MARY BREDEN originally set up the business side of the company and was the creative talent behind many of our product designs. She also created all the brochures and literature you'll receive, and doubled as Erik's photographic assistant in the field.

Mary has since answered a calling to become a minister. She attended Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and, after graduating in June 2006, accepted a call to the Andrews Presbyterian Church in Andrews, Texas in February 2007. In August 2010 she and Erik to moved Harlingen, Texas to live in the Rio Grande Valley.

Mary was introduced to birds when she met Erik. Their first "date" was on a bitterly cold February day when they went out looking (unsuccessfully) for a Le Conte's Sparrow that had been reported from Sandy Hook, New Jersey. That might have been enough to turn off anyone, but, Mary soon became "hooked" on birds when, on another outing, a flock of Cedar Waxwings descended from the sky and filled the bushes and trees all around. It was a magic moment!