John Vanderpoel and I undertook a whirlwind tour of much of Colorado this weekend as a replacement for a trip to the underwater world of North Dakota for Baird's Sparrows, Sprague's Pipits and Gray Partridge. John, as you might know, is doing a Big Year (see http://www.bigyear2011.com ) and having a whole lot of fun in the process.
Friday afternoon we set off for Bent's Old Fort outside of La Junta in search (well audio search) of Black Rail. On the way we saw two well equipped photographers stopped by the side of the road for no visible reason. Upon inspection it turned out to be a den of 6 Swift Foxes only yards from the road; pretty exciting. See John's website for photos. Next we stopped at the High Plains Sportsman Club pond off CO 71 between Limon and Ordway. I spotted an odd black bird sleeping in a dead snag in the pond and said, "That looks funny." The bird had its head tucked between it wings, but movement of some Black-crowned Night Herons caused a ruckus and the bird lifted its head to hiss at the offensive herons. Short thin bill; black lores, thin neck, long tail, etc. Neotropic Cormorant-that makes my second Gulf Coast water bird on a tiny dry-plains body of water this year (the first being Brown Pelican in Kit Carson!). We got to Bent's Old Fort NHS right at sundown to try for rails. Unfortunately, while Virginia's called continuously, we had no Black Rails. After both of us had swelled to blimp size from mosquito bites, we decided to go on to Ft. Lyons. Here the Blacks were calling like crazy-maybe about 6 of them. A high five ensued (John's year bird number 646) and it was off to a pretty unsatisfying dinner on the road and a late night in Pueblo. (12:00 midnight bed times are not good for this aging birder.) Saturday we raced out of Pueblo to the west slope for more birding fun. Just short of Monarch Pass we stopped and found a Gray Jay followed by a little dance-Colorado year bird #300 for me. Going on to Gunnison we headed down the road just west of the airport to try for thirsty Gunnison Sage Grouse. No luck (who says these write ups are just one unrepeatable success after another?); maybe we were too early in the year or too late in the day. This is still my favorite place to try for this chicken. We continued on to Montrose and then down to Ouray. I thought Black Swifts would be a certainty in Box Canyon. Well they are now! The first female to lay an egg had done so on Friday or Saturday and by Saturday afternoon was on nest. You could see at least one other nest all ready for the happy event. Mission accomplished (#647 for John) we headed back to Delta. We could find no evidence of Common Black Hawk in Confluence Park (I guess our luck had run out on black birds), but we were surprised by a Caspian Tern on the lake-what an oddity. We still had enough time for a trip up to the Escalante Canyon even as the temps inched close to 100. At the three mile mark past the bridge over the Gunnison John shouted me to a halt-Chukar chick! I saw the mother as she tried to distract us then John had another chick. (Again, see John's web site for photos of his #648.) As we proceeded we had a second group of four Chukar's and then two more for a total of nine. Time to raise a glass. This morning we sped up to Colorado National Monument to try for Gray Vireo-out of the frying pan and into the Devil's Kitchen! We hiked in past the Black-chinned Sparrow spot and I've never experience such silence! Here it was, 7:00 a.m. in the morning in the middle of great Pinyon-Juniper habitat in a National Monument and there was not one bird making a sound! Discouraged, John and I decided to retreat and try another more distant stop. But then I heard a bit of a call-"That's a Gray!" We saw a bird horribly back lit and moved around to get a better look. It was singing a song like a Plumbeous but without a "Vireo" at the end. Once we had a better sun angle we had the bird come in a couple of times (clearly a Gray not a Lead) and even found the nest that it was building in a Juniperand trying on for size. Wow! (#649 and the main neo-tropical migrants out of the way). Plus it was early enough for us to try our first trip up the Land's End Road onto Grand Mesa. So, up and up and back and forth and back and forth we went until we hit the first bit of aspens along the road. And right as Peter Gent as told us-Red-naped Sapsucker. Well that's not the biggest heart stopper among Colorado birds, but it was John's #650 for the year. We went on up and along and over and down Grand Mesa, then past the always enjoyable Fruitgrowers' Reservoir, up to McClure Pass and down to Glenwood Springs on our way home. Word to the wise-don't try that at least on a Sunday afternoon. It took us 45 minutes to move 0.3 miles in Glenwood Springs and the going on I-70 wasn't much better through the canyon. Beyond that things were okay until we approached Georgetown where again it was the better part of 45 minutes to move from there to Idaho Springs. We didn't notice much. Bill Kaempfer Boulder -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Colorado Birds" group. To post to this group, send email to cobirds@googlegroups.com. 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