It's been windy of late in Lamar, like everywhere else. But I'll put southeastern CO up against anywhere for meteorological extremes. We need to invent some new weather descriptors. Sunday the big, ominous cloud approaching town from the west was the color of milk chocolate. The small amount of rain that fell was more like dilute mud than anything else. Ask everybody down here who owns a white vehicle because dark ones get too hot in the summer. There was a bit of thunder, lightning, and hail mixed in for accent. The State Patrol closed 287 south of town for at least the second time this year due to minimal visibility. Somebody somewhere is getting a lot of free dirt. The City needs to pay stipends, maybe provide lengthy residencies, for creative artists to brainstorm beneficial uses for tumbleweeds. You have to admit, watching a platoon (division?) of them advance across a field, they are amazing plants. Night (and day) of the living dead plants. Botanical zombies.
The word "surprised" was applied to a Broad-winged Hawk seen here yesterday. NOTHING should surprise anyone who has any experience about this place with birds, weather, or people (with or without binoculars).
Duane Nelson finds a surreal, crisp Hermit Warbler at Tempel's Grove (Bent). A woman from Rhode Island, who should have been too tired from the demands of her grouse tour led by Norm Lewis, finds a beautiful Golden-winged Warbler trying to blend in among Yellow-rumps feeding in the cottonwood flowers at Lamar Community College. Mark Peterson finds not one, but two, Summer Tanagers on the ground flipping over leaves on Prowers Rd SS a little east of US287, with Guinea Hens and Peacocks in the background. Two Gray-cheeked Thrushes have been seen of late, one at a private farm south of Lamar and another at Tempel's (in April, no less). A very rare spring Rufous Hummingbird watched that chocolate sky last weekend. Was it really a Broad-tail that flew thru the storm for a make-over? At least 14 species of warblers have been seen in Prowers and Bent Counties so far (in April, no less). Never in 40 years of coming down here have I seen so many Hermit Thrushes and Wilson's Warblers in spring as have been present the last few days. Yesterday a Hermit Thrush was on the ground in a patch of prairie south of Holly where Lesser Prairie-Chickens have been reported, mixing with Grasshopper Sparrows on territory. Nearby (Prowers Road B west of SR89 about a mile w of the Kansas line) two Mountain Plovers pulled cutworms out of a sparse, muddy wheat field. Three more Hermit Thrushes were among the depressing dorm foundations in the former Japanese-American Relocation Camp at Amache w of Granada, where there was also a bright male Audubon's Warbler just sitting on the ground and a Least Flycatcher plying calmer air on the backside of a tight juniper windbreak. Two Willets towered over a mixed flock of blackbirds in a flooded corral within the City limits of Holly. The pair of Scissor-tailed Flycatchers reported near a motel in Holly could still be present. Certainly super windy conditions require them to do something special in deference to those posterior plumes.
Getting back to Hermit Thrushes and Wilson's Warblers, every good patch of habitat has multiples of both. It is like the south winds that preceded these relentless north winds brought them in, then sentenced them to three days of evolutionary boot camp trying to survive by hiding down low on the south side of understory vegetation eating whatever they can find.
Anyone who thinks birds aren't tough, needs to have been outside the last couple days.
Dave Leatherman
Fort Collins
The word "surprised" was applied to a Broad-winged Hawk seen here yesterday. NOTHING should surprise anyone who has any experience about this place with birds, weather, or people (with or without binoculars).
Duane Nelson finds a surreal, crisp Hermit Warbler at Tempel's Grove (Bent). A woman from Rhode Island, who should have been too tired from the demands of her grouse tour led by Norm Lewis, finds a beautiful Golden-winged Warbler trying to blend in among Yellow-rumps feeding in the cottonwood flowers at Lamar Community College. Mark Peterson finds not one, but two, Summer Tanagers on the ground flipping over leaves on Prowers Rd SS a little east of US287, with Guinea Hens and Peacocks in the background. Two Gray-cheeked Thrushes have been seen of late, one at a private farm south of Lamar and another at Tempel's (in April, no less). A very rare spring Rufous Hummingbird watched that chocolate sky last weekend. Was it really a Broad-tail that flew thru the storm for a make-over? At least 14 species of warblers have been seen in Prowers and Bent Counties so far (in April, no less). Never in 40 years of coming down here have I seen so many Hermit Thrushes and Wilson's Warblers in spring as have been present the last few days. Yesterday a Hermit Thrush was on the ground in a patch of prairie south of Holly where Lesser Prairie-Chickens have been reported, mixing with Grasshopper Sparrows on territory. Nearby (Prowers Road B west of SR89 about a mile w of the Kansas line) two Mountain Plovers pulled cutworms out of a sparse, muddy wheat field. Three more Hermit Thrushes were among the depressing dorm foundations in the former Japanese-American Relocation Camp at Amache w of Granada, where there was also a bright male Audubon's Warbler just sitting on the ground and a Least Flycatcher plying calmer air on the backside of a tight juniper windbreak. Two Willets towered over a mixed flock of blackbirds in a flooded corral within the City limits of Holly. The pair of Scissor-tailed Flycatchers reported near a motel in Holly could still be present. Certainly super windy conditions require them to do something special in deference to those posterior plumes.
Getting back to Hermit Thrushes and Wilson's Warblers, every good patch of habitat has multiples of both. It is like the south winds that preceded these relentless north winds brought them in, then sentenced them to three days of evolutionary boot camp trying to survive by hiding down low on the south side of understory vegetation eating whatever they can find.
Anyone who thinks birds aren't tough, needs to have been outside the last couple days.
Dave Leatherman
Fort Collins
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