Our Denver Audubon bird class scaled Genesee Mtn. this morning. We call it
a "Pretty-Lady" day. Painted Ladies all over the hillside, quite distracting
when you want to turn them into birds.
But most amazing: on the top of Genesee, and only on a narrow line along
the topmost section, pods of Lady-bird Beetles (aka Lady Bugs). They snuggled
in tightly-massed groups of 100 or more, folded into the shelter of Mountain
Mahogany and Wild Rose bushes. Several pods on a bush, on perhaps 10 shrubs.
The total must have amounted to 5,000-10,000, all just hunkered down waiting
for ??.
The birds behaved poorly for us who wanted good definitive looks.
Gray-headed Juncos acted like juncos, but Yellow-rumped Warblers also acted
like juncos (but they sortied into tall grass, where we couldn't see them,
looking, I suppose, for insects).
Pygmy Nuthatches noisy everywhere, but did not cooperate in showing
themselves.
Lots (a dozen or more) of Western Bluebirds that we did see well.
A few migrating raptors -- a Northern Harrier, 2 Accipiter spec., and one
Northern Goshawk (Confirmed by a photo). A rufous-morph Red-tailed Hawk that
perched for scope views by the whole class and which then flew overhead.
PS: Dave Leatherman: do birds eat lady-bugs? Does anything? These didn't
seem to have any hovering predators.
Hugh Kingery
Franktown, CO
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"Colorado Birds" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email
to [email protected].
To post to this group, send email to [email protected].
To view this discussion on the web visit
https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/cobirds/15ed4f28f2f-c09-e349%40webjas-vae246.srv.aolmail.net.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
