Wednesday last week (9/20), while walking my dog near Chapel Hill Memorial Gardens (Arapahoe Co.), I found a yellow-shafted flicker feather, likely from one of the intergrades I saw around my yard nearby in mid-August. The bird that likely dropped this feather seemed to be in a family of at least five; at least one member of that family -- though I was never sure if it was the same flicker as the one that had the yellow-underside -- had a red malar and also weak red feathering on its nape. Among that family, I only noticed one flicker with a yellow-underside, but I can't say I got a good look at all of them.
Later that on the 20th, I followed an unfamiliar call to find a House Wren scolding a cat in my neighbor's yard, backed up by a squirrel. I rattled the chain link fence between us; my dog caught on, barked defensively, and the cat fled.
On Friday (9/22), I heard, through my open kitchen window, a Great Horned Owl calling around 5:30 AM. After sunup, I spotted my first of fall Green-tailed Towhee and MacGillivray's Warbler in my yard.
On Saturday (9/23), I visited Marjorie Perry Nature Preserve (Greenwood Village) with a co-worker who took up birding in January. He added several lifers. Highlights included...good looks at Spotted Towhees, which were taking conspicuous perches and sort-of-singing. (I tracked one down that had a song I never heard. Sadly, my recording of this bird is undecipherable.) A first-of-the-fall Pied-billed Grebe was on the middle pond, and two Western Tanagers were in the trees around the water. The highlight, though, was a heap of sparrows moving from perch to perch among cattails. Chipping, Song, Lincoln's (lifer for him, FOS for me), and White-crowned Sparrows (another lifer for him, FOS for me) picked a single, downed branch to stand around, giving us an opportunity to get good looks at all. He especially liked the black-and-white-crowned White-crowned Sparrow, and I realized how difficult it is to describe a Lincoln's Sparrow as it hops around a branch, occasionally dodging an aggressive Song Sparrow.
On Sunday morning (9/24), I briefly visited Willow Spring Open Space (back in Centennial). I had my first of fall Ruby-crowned Kinglet and Orange-crowned Warbler there; these were also my first of both birds at the open space. The two of them, a Wilson's Warbler, a Common Yellowthroat, and some chickadees were all near the beaver dam on the eastern side of the open space; all were agitated, chipping hard but still occasionally feeding, due to the presence of a preening Cooper's Hawk. A flock of around 300 blackbirds, which flew into then out of the preserve, and a calling Virginia Rail were among the other highlights.
This morning (9/25), I had a White-crowned Sparrow in my yard. During a midday run at Chapel Hill Memorial Gardens, I encountered two scrub jays and a Western Meadowlark; both are new birds for me at the cemetery. I also noticed that the cemetery tore up the hill of pigweed, but Vesper Sparrows were still moving around the muddy field. One day, it'll probably all be grass. The meadowlark probably won't come back and maybe not the sparrows either, but perhaps they'll have excluded the mangy coyote who was always lounging around those weeds...
- Jared Del Rosso
Centennial, CO
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