VERY quiet yesterday afternoon at Crow Valley. I walked the entire campground circuit and had a total of 17 species. Highlight was an unidentified empid in elms just nw of the antique farm machinery exhibit that well could have been a Gray, but maybe a less exciting Dusky. Very long tailed and slender, longish beak, gray-green (aren't they all?), did not get a good feel for which direction the tail wag started, medium to short primary extension, lower mandible mostly yellow, thin unteardropped eyering, flew off before I came back to consciousness after being lulled into expecting to see no birds. As an example, I saw not a single individual bird walking west from the picnic shelter along the creekbed to the historically birdy southwestern corner, all along the west side creekbed, thru the group area in the northwestern corner. Then a glorious Mourning Dove flew over. Other species seen, 1 of each unless otherwise noted, were Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, Brown Thrasher, Barn Swallow, Lark Bunting, Clay-colored Sparrow, Blue Jay, American Robin (3 of them to pad the count), House Wren, Northern Flicker, Wilson's Warbler (4), Western Wood-Pewee, Red-tailed Hawk, American Kestrel, Horned Lark (chaotic flock of 2), Downy Woodpecker. By contrast, the town of Briggsdale teamed with Rock Doves, Eurasian Collared-Doves, House Sparrows, European Starlings, House Finches, Blue Jays and a robin.
Cattle pond in the nw corner near the big Russian-olive by the gate is all but dried up. Whole place seemed very dry. Barking dog mentioned by Bob Righter is gone (I think, or maybe just off with its owner for the day, tent still there).
Saw perhaps the same western hognose snake as last visit (attached shows this beauty curious about why it is all of a sudden up in the air being held briefly by a potential predator who is apparently benign). Butterflies included question-mark, red admiral and monarch. Noteable were two net-winged beetles (Calopteron sp.).
You know how it goes. We all only get so many chips each day to start the outdoor poker game we call "birding". Apparently I had used all mine up in the morning at Timnath Reservoir when Christine Sparks and John Shenot suggested the fairly innocuous-looking shorebird I tried to talk them out of was really the Buff-breasted Sandpiper found by Irene Fortune and Bobbie Tilmant (thank you) on the 4th. Andy Bankert, with I suspect far more experience with Buff-breasted Sandpiper than the 5 or so of us (Joe, Jay, Gwen, Carol) standing there put together, walked up from the mudflats and confirmed our ID, and Josh Bruening got further confirmation with his nice photos obtained down on the flats which he shared with the world on eBird and announced on COBIRDS. Congrats again to finders Bobbie and Irene, and all the rest who got a lifer with this great bird for shorebird habitat-challenged Larimer County.
Dave Leatherman
Fort Collins
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