Not far north of Fort Collins along Route 1 (cottonwood w of mailbox for 4629)
just north of Terry Lake and the entrance to the Eagle Lake Subdivision, I had
a Merlin which I am fairly certain was a "Pacific (aka "black" or sukleyi)
race. It perched high in a cottonwood against an overcast sky facing away from
me. I got suckyi (i.e. very poor) photos before it flew off toward the nw
corner of Terry Lake. This is only about the 5th I've ever seen in CO.
Because I did not observe and photograph the underparts, the ID to subspecies
will never be certain but the back was quite dark.
Eagle Lake Subdivision is a gated community but I was told it is probably OK to
go just beyond the always-open (in my experience) gate a little ways, pull into
the gravel parking area, and view the lake to the north. I the past I have
seen lots of gulls at this time of year, including Lesser Black-backed. Today
there were fully 1100 Redheads. Impossible to count exactly, as they were
diving a lot, but this total is pretty close.
North Poudre #3 was almost ice-free and had nothing exceptional.
Just west of Larimer CR11 on CR70 (i.e., a mile or so north of North Poudre #3)
is an unnamed pond on the north side near a small power station. Mostly hiding
in the vegetation at the north end of this pond were about 60 Sandhill Cranes.
Hamilton Reservoir did not have a lot of birds but in the far west bays were
over 100 Canvasbacks. Also, 1 Pied-billed Grebe, a few Horned Grebes, a few
Western Grebes (probably all of these wintered).
Dave Leatherman
Fort Collins
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