Hello, Birders. It was supposed to be sunny and 60 degrees Fahrenheit this afternoon, Thursday, March 24th, at Walden Ponds, Boulder County. Instead, there were lowering clouds and falling temperatures, with a beautiful snow squall blowing in off the Flatirons. Love it.
Anyhow, Hannah and Andrew and I had a nice visit to the Walden/Sawhill complex. Here's what we found: * the adult Tundra Swan still present on Cottonwood Marsh. * 3 Wood Ducks (2 drakes, 1 hen) on Boulder Creek. * The "hybrid teal." Except I'm pretty sure it's not what folks have been calling it. See my next message. * 3 Blue-winged Teals (2 drakes, 1 hen) on Cottonwood Marsh. * 3 drake Cinnamon Teals on one of the Sawhill ponds. * 5 Lesser Scaup (1 drake, 4 hens) on Cottonwood Marsh. * hooting Redheads and buzzing goldeneyes; I love those sounds! * a Pied-billed Grebe, wailing like a tormented sinner in Hell. * ~10 Great Blue Herons at the rookery. * an adult Bald Eagle on a pole. * an immature (second-cycle?) Golden Eagle getting strafed by a juvenile Northern Harrier. * among many Red-tailed Hawks, a muddy dark-morph adult "Western" and a stunningly pale adult that we couldn't put in a box. * a Greater Yellowlegs along Cottonwood Marsh and another on one of the Sawhill Ponds. * 1 Hairy Woodpecker along Boulder Creek. * 1 Say's Phoebe at an outhouse; the new Crossley Guide confirms a close association between outhouses and birds in the genus Sayornis. * 1 latish adult Northern Shrike over on the Sawhill side. * 5 Tree Swallows flying about the solar panel farm. * 2 nelsoni White-breasted Nuthatches and 1 indeterminate White-breasted Nuthatch. * 1 Brown Creeper working a cottonwood along Boulder Creek. * 1 Marsh Wren babbling its head off in the cattails at the edge of Cottonwood Marsh. * 1 Audubon's Warbler along Boulder Creek. * a few Common Grackles. We saw and heard 53 species plus sundry forms and spuhs and hybrids and such. By the way, the "book of lies" had recent reports of Hudsonian Godwit and Long-tailed Duck. On the drive home, joined by Kei, we saw a flock of American White Pelicans. The sun had come out, brilliantly so, and the birds reminded me of Terry Tempest Williams' unforgettable rendering: "Up ahead, two dozen white pelicans were creating a spiral staircase as they flew. It looked like a feathered DNA molecule. Their wings reflected the sun. The light shifted, and they disappeared. It shifted again and I found form. Escher's inspiration." ------------------------------- Ted Floyd Editor, Birding Blog: http://tinyurl.com/4n6qswt Twitter: http://tinyurl.com/2ejzlzv Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/2wkvwxs ------------------------------- -- 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.com/group/cobirds?hl=en.
