Hey, all. Nice day to be out and about, eh? After a quite late start (bit of a story...), Andrew Floyd and Mason Dinaar and I headed into the Boulder County foothills. At the monster trailhead at Heil Valley Ranch, every conceivable parking space--legal and illegal--was full, so I dropped the lads off and retreated south a short ways to the Joder Ranch trailhead, where there was one (1) other car. Go figure.
Joder had a marvelous flock of *mountain bluebirds <https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/214047761>* plucking caterpillars off the ground. They left the big millipede <https://www.facebook.com/groups/381476328587993/permalink/2739851682750434/> alone, though; Tom Schultz, over at Arthropods Colorado, tells me it was in the genus *Spirobolida*. Lots of *Woodhouse scrub-jays* <https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/214065041> there, too. Farther along the trail, where the ponderosa pines start to get thick, there were *type 2 red crossbills* *kwew*ping, *toop*ing, and even full-on singing <https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/213998631>. <--That song *wasn't* given by an adult male, by the way. As I was headed back to Heil Valley Ranch to pick up Andrew and Mason, I ran into (and nearly ran over) Carl Bendorf, who had attracted a biblical plague of dickey birds to the general vicinity of his parked car. Of note was a *type 2 red crossbill* incessantly *toop*ing <https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/214004521>. By the way, the schnozzes <https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/214051821> of type 2s are really large. Wish I'd gotten to the Heil parking lot (still packed beyond capacity) just a tad earlier, for Andrew had just photo'd a comma <https://www.facebook.com/groups/381476328587993/permalink/2739958616073074/>--a hoary comma, we believe--on his bike. Up in the woods, Andrew and Mason got astonishing video of 20 *wild turkeys* digging in the ground for food; what's up with that? Okay, then it was over to Centennial Middle School (why not?) to audio-record a *spotted towhee* (again, why not?). It's often frustrating when the "wrong" bird audio-bombs your recording <https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/214036611>, but how 'bout when the "wrong" bird is a refulgent *northern cardinal!* There was a barely audible *cedar waxwing* here, too, my first detection this year of the 2020 ABA Bird of the Year. Later in the day, I walked around Greenlee Preserve & environs, eastern Boulder County. No rarities, but it was nice to see *bushtits* (and Karen Axe with the bushtits), searingly beautiful *redheads* in the setting sun, both male and female *great horned owls* hooting well before sundown, and an impressively vocal *Cooper hawk,* <https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/214076651> an adult female, I believe. Alrighty, I gotta go now, and lose an hour of sleep. Whose dumb idea was that anyhow? Ted Floyd Lafayette, Boulder County -- 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 view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/cobirds/c81a615b-aa41-4402-bdc3-fc9f5b7c5f3d%40googlegroups.com.
