Dean Shoup and I made a trip today to bird a lot of the mtn lakes. We didn't get to nearly as many spots as we hoped. The first couple stops were quite birdy and we spent a lot of time digging through scads of waterfowl.
Highlights: Eleven Mile Res - Oodles of coots with a good variety of waterfowl mixed in at least 9 Surf Scoters (prob 13) 3, likely 4, White-winged Scoters one continuing female Long-tailed Duck 450+ Common Goldeneye 4 common loons and a loon sp. Wood Duck drake was unexpected 18+ Bonaparte's Gulls one late American Pipit Spinney Mountain Res - Many thousands of birds, mostly quite far away, and we didn't much spend time there, but we spotted 2 Common Loons. We could have spent several hours working Spinney. Antero Res - Thanks to some intel from Kathy Dunning, we relocated 3 likely Tundra Swans, and a Pacific Loon, otherwise, lots of expected species, incl Bonaparte's Gulls, and a lot of wind. We were way behind schedule at this point, but the birding was great, so we went to Buena Vista (Chaffee). We were cruising a neighborhood trying to get to the Ice Ponds and I spotted a Lewis's Woodpecker flying by. Dean wanted to find a Lewis's in town and I think he was skeptical, but he threw me a bone and stopped, and a few seconds later one flew over the car! Ice Ponds - Lots of waterfowl, but the highlight (for me) was 40+ Pinyon Jays working the pines and carrying on. We watched them for about 15 minutes. I've only seen them a few times, so I was happy to spend some time with them. They are a fun and interesting species. Scott Somershoe Littleton, Jefferson 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 cobirds+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to cobirds@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/cobirds/CAJmtx%2BVUtXzidMViery24wVfjKo28chAmFG5vjxEs50CSTVQ3A%40mail.gmail.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
