Hello, Birders.
Eight intrepid birders assembled at the snowy Fox Ranch, Yuma County, at 6am this morning, Saturday, Oct. 6th. Four of us (Todd Deininger, David Gillilan, Bill Schmoker, and I) worked the ranch east of Yuma County Road U. Four others (Lisa Edwards, Dan Maynard, Steve Mlodinow, and Mark Peterson) were sentenced to a death march all the way up to Yuma County Road P. My group got off to a fine start. The first bird we put bins on was a Winter Wren. The next bird we put bins on was a White-throated Sparrow (found yesterday evening by David). The third bird we put bins on was a Field Sparrow. And the fourth bird we put bins on was a Palm Warbler. And that was pretty much it for the rest of the morning. Nevertheless, we had a jolly time traipsing thru the white and drifted snow. At one point, as we stood in the snowy woods, we could hear and see *no birds at all*--until an Eastern Screech-Owl, of all things, started vocalizing, loudly and declamatorily so. We saw nice numbers of Eastern and Mountain bluebirds throughout the morning, a flyover longspur (probably McCown's), a tardy Clay-colored Sparrow, *no* Ammodramus sparrows at all as far as we could tell, and a coupla indeterminate birds: a towhee saying "chewink" (an Eastern phenotype, of course) that we never laid eyes on, and a meadowlark giving a nice high-frequency flight call (again, an Eastern phenotype). The Edwards/Maynard/Mlodinow/Peterson group did great, with Philadelphia Vireo, Cassin's Vireo, Pacific Wren, White-throated Sparrow, Swamp Sparrow, and probably some other stuff I can't remember right now. Like us, they found no for-sure Ammos. This just wasn't the day, I guess. Todd, David, Bill, and I stopped by Last Chance, Washington County, on the way home. We saw a beautiful male Black-throated Blue Warbler--presumably the bird that's been reported by a number of other folks. Also a couple of White-throated Sparrows, a Clay-colored Sparrow, and the lost Sora. We saw a juvenile sapsucker that I thought looked good for Red-naped: white wing-patch framed by extensive black on the wing coverts; distinct and dark crown; and dark-dusky plumage aspect overall. However, other marks (apparent absence of red on head, intermediate/tweener back pattern) weren't as good. Not sure about this one, although my (fallible) sixth sense whispered Red-naped to me. This outing was the third and final in a 2012 series of expeditions sponsored by Colorado Field Ornithologists (CFO) and The Nature Conservancy in Colorado (TNC-Colorado). Trip reports for CFO/TNC-Colorado outings earlier in 2012 can be found here: tinyurl.com/79k6egp (Carpenter Ranch, July 2012) and tinyurl.com/7vxzsz8 (Brett Gray Ranch, June 2012). Thanks to CFO and TNC-Colorado for these wonderful birding opportunities! Ted Floyd [email protected] Lafayette, Boulder County, Colorado -- 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 https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
