I ventured out this afternoon but decided to stay local rather than head up to Lake Estes since I was fairly certain if I made a trip for warblers up there they would all be gone. Between Boulder and Longmont I found some good species, but did not see some of the stuff others reported.
First, I should retract the posting that I made in the spring about good birding possibilities at what used to be known as Ball Brothers Grove in east Boulder. Access into the Roche Chemical/Boulder Humane Society area is now forbidden by a set of off-putting signs. I can only surmise that two well know Colorado listers who used to work for Roche did not end up fostering a good opinion of birding with the firm! In any event, a walk along the railroad tracks in this area produced a small flock of chickadees and yellow-rumps, but not much else. Prince Lake #2 had the four most likely gull species including my first Herring of the fall and a lingering Franklins. The always hard to see satisfactorily Panama Reservoir has been drawn way down. Expansive mud flats weren't enough to attract any shorebirds that I saw but there were still triple digit White Pelicans. On to Union, were I did not see any loons at all, nor a Red-necked Grebe, but I did see Christian Nunes who also didn't have much to report. But there was something of interest to report-in the NW corner I saw a couple of Clarks Grebes still tending young on October 26th! First I saw one adult feeding a fish to a bird that was still sub adult sized and in juvenal plumage, then I saw a second adult surrounded by four more juvenile birds that were also still smaller than the adults (and I'm guessing that birds noticeably smaller than adults are still incapable of long or even any flight). I checked the Colorado Breeding Bird Atlas and noted that Union Reservoir was undoubtedly a site where breeding was confirmed during the first atlas (one of only two north of Denver, and I remember seeing the other record on its floating nest at Ireland Reservoir east of Hudson and that was on June 6th, four and a half months earlier in the year than this observation!). I also noted that the latest confirmation date for either big grebe in the first atlas was in early August. Ish was full of water for a change, but almost devoid of birds-heavily hunted I presume. Boulder County's Terry Reservoir had a fairly normal set of birds, but my first Common Mergansers of the day. Tiny and hard to see Clark Reservoir had the best set of ducks for the day, by far including Redhead and Ring-necked. McIntosh was not particularly productive, but Lagerman had a nice group of six Greater Yellowlegs which were so plump in the cold that I'm glad that one of them gave an identifying call. Finally at Boulder Reservoir I ran into some loons-three common together. I also had a group of about 40 Sandhill Cranes fly over on the north side of the reservoir. Bill Kaempfer Boulder --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Colorado Field Ornithologists: http://www.cfo-link.org/ Colorado County Birding: http://www.coloradocountybirding.com/ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Colorado Birds" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.as/group/cobirds?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
