Sorry for the slow reporting...on Jan 20 I took a mountain vista drive through Park County with my family, birding mostly incidentally along Hwys 24 and 285. I did not look at any of the reservoirs, which I imagine were all frozen.
At South Park I spotted 5 ROUGH-LEGGED HAWKS in 4 locations. NORTHERN SHRIKES were at Divide and Hartzel. Single CLARK'S NUTCRACKERS were at Wilkerson Pass and Kenosha Pass. A pond near the parking area for 63 Ranch SWA was surprsingly ice-free and had 9 species of ducks, with a pair of HOODED MERGANSERS perhaps being of the most interest (at least the count was flagged on my eBird checklist as a "high count"). An AMERICAN DIPPER was at some open patches of the mostly iced-topped South Platte near Grant. Around St. Mary of the Rockies Church at Crow Hill (or is the community Deer Creek?), off Hwy 285 there was a juv. NORTHERN GOSHAWK, a NORTHERN PYGMY-OWL, and a flight of 347 AMERICAN CROWS moving from the Denver direction toward a roost further upslope even from where I was viewing. I've been observing some similar movements to/from roosts in the higher mountains by birds commuting from mountain roosts to the Metro Area. Why are they apparently roosting up high? David Suddjian Littleton -- 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/CAGj6RoqAHcjdYR48e4f7H8n2S_Ca6VgFq5YP6UbgU3fhy-gXag%40mail.gmail.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
