Monday, 22 September 2014

[cobirds] Pawnee Grasslands, etc. (Weld) on 9/21/14

Norma's Grove west of Weld CR57 on Weld CR100 was pretty quiet but did have a Cassin's Kingbird.

At the intersection of Murphy's Pasture Road (GR96) and CR69 is a windmill with a cattle tank full of water.  This has always been a bird-attracting area and a great place to study sparrows.  In the general area of this intersection today were two Rock Wrens, several Savannah Sparrows, a Grasshopper Sparrow, several Chestnut-collared Longspurs (including lots of young birds that would be tough to get onto and ID without knowing the flight call), two late Lark Buntings,  plus Brewer's, Clay-colored, Chipping, Vesper, and Gambel's race White-crowned Sparrows.

Crow Valley Campground, like Norma's Grove, was not crawling with birds but a long visit produced 42 species including Cassin's Kingbird, a late Western Kingbird, a late Townsend's Warbler, two Swainson's Thrushes, two latish Western Tanagers, a couple empids I did not see well enough to positively ID but believe one of them was a Cordilleran.  The latter bird was in a juniper in the sw corner and had a very large caterpillar in its beak in very bad lighting.  When I jack the exposure on the photos well enough to see anything, it is clear the bird has a big teardrop eyering, yellow underparts, and a long primary projection.  No sapsuckers or White-throated Sparrows, which surprised me.  A few Blue-gray Gnatcatchers, a late singing Tibicen dealbatus (dog-day cicada), several Wilson's Warblers, one Orange-crown, one Sage Thrasher, heard a flyover McCown's Longspur (maybe two), several migrating freshly-emerged Monarchs, and two late Common Nighthawks.

Crom Lake, which now has high water, had over 20 phalaropes, including several Red-necked.

Barn Swallows persist at all the above locations.

Dave Leatherman
Fort Collins


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