[cobirds] Southeastern Colorado this weekend, Baca, Prowers, Otero Counties

Hello all,

I spent a marvelous weekend exploring in south eastern Colorado in Otero, Prowers and Baca Counties with one brief foray into Las Animas County. It was a gorgeous, sunny and warm (72-79 degrees for the high) weekend. Apparently my primary goal of the weekend was to test Ebird's filters as many birds popped up as rare. I basically would see a bird, get my binoculars on it to ID it, watch for as long as I could or wanted to, put the bird into the ebird app - and "Rare" would pop up. This wasn't every bird but it happened quite often, even with birds that didn't seem rare at all, but perhaps just early.

Friday I meandered on my way from Colorado Springs to Lamar with stops at Rocky Ford SWA, Holbrook Reservoir, Cheraw Lake, Las Animas Fish Hatchery, and Lamar Community College woods.  The Rocky Ford highlight was 45 magnificent American White Pelicans circling in the sky; a pile of car window glass at one of the parking areas dissuaded me from my intended walk. There was almost nothing at Holbrook but a Bald Eagle and Prairie Falcon and a few vocal Killdeer. Cheraw had a good variety of ducks while the fish hatchery held nothing of note; I ended my day at Lamar Community College where two male Northern Cardinals, a Red-bellied Woodpecker and my first warbler of the year, Yellow-Rumped Warbler kept me entertained along with a host of other birds. My favorite moment at the end of the day happened as I sat by a pool of water behind the college and a Sharp-shinned Hawk flew in and landed about 10 feet away. It stayed just long enough to notice me and then was off again- I definitely had a close view of that bird! Heading to the hotel for the night, I noticed a large group of geese in the sky north east of Lamar and went out to check them out. I managed to track them down as they dropped into a farmer's field and was able to pick out about 10 Ross's Geese amongst the 500 Snow Geese and 150 Canada Geese before the light completely faded. What a treat!

Saturday I went down to Baca County visiting Carizzo Canyon and Cottonwood Canyon, seemingly a stone's throw from the border of Oklahoma and New Mexico. The wind was blowing hard all day, which made for difficult photography and listening conditions. Even so, that area of the state is just magical and people are few and far between. I think I saw 4 people in the span of about 8 hours in the Comanche Grasslands. When I was stopped at the side of County Road M to watch some meadowlarks, a rancher in a truck stopped to ask me if it was rush hour (as there was 2 of us on the road); he was still laughing at his own joke as he drove away.  At Carizzo, the water is high enough to get my feet wet to walk the trail (passes over the creek twice) but the Canyon itself is just gorgeous with deciduous trees starting to leaf out. I saw hundreds of American Robins, a group of Chihuahan Ravens calling, chasing and harassing  a Red-tailed Hawk, a Canyon Wren singing away and a Loggerhead Shrike, amongst other birds. Cottonwood Canyon was quiet overall though the onslaught of robins continued. I added three Rufous-Crowned Sparrows, Canyon Towhees, Sage Thrashers, Mountain Bluebirds, one McCown's Longspur and a few others.

Sunday (today) was another magical day when I headed back west and north, not as windy and much warmer to start the day than Saturday. I started off at Lake Hasty with a large covey of Scaled Quail, a great variety of ducks including Blue-winged Teal, Pied-billed Grebes, 2 Eastern Bluebirds, singing Marsh Wrens, a Red-bellied Woodpecker, 2 Eastern form White-breasted Nuthatches calling repeatedly and much more. A stop at the little cemetery north of John Martin Reservoir produced a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, Barn Owl and Great-Horned Owl. Fort Lyon SWA had hundreds of American Wigeon, several dozen Northern Pintail and several raptors, including a dark-morph Harlan's Red-tailed Hawk. Oxbow SWA was quiet and hot early this afternoon, producing a Northern Mockingbird and not much else. Not surprisingly, Bent's Old Fort was also really quiet though I was treated to a Ring-necked Pheasant bolting across the road.

I picked up an astounding 16 first of the year birds this weekend, much more than I expected and so much fun!  

Happy birding all,

Gloria Nikolai, now back home in El Paso County 

FYI: The rare birds this weekend included the Northern Mockingbird, Pied-billed Grebe, Rufous-crowned Sparrow, Sage Thrasher, Canyon Towhee and Say's Phoebe.