Over the past few days, my short list of birds that I've seen at Chapel Hill Memorial Gardens (Arapahoe) has grown by five. The cemetery is east of deKoevend Park in Centennial, across University and south of E. Caley Ave. It's has an interesting mix of trees, albeit relatively small and sparsely planted ones. There are few bushes, though a line of them on the western border separates the cemetery from private residences.
As for those new five birds…
On Thursday evening (8/7), while driving to Marjorie Perry Nature Preserve, I spotted a Common Nighthawk (#52 for me there) flying over the cemetery. There were also two dozen or so magpies & three dozen or so crows at the cemetery. This time of year, crows seem to use the cemetery as a staging ground. It's something to behold, as you can sometimes get a hundred or so of them among the gravestones.
On Friday morning, I took my dog for a walk at Chapel Hill. Along the western border of the cemetery was a Western Wood-Pewee (#53) and a Wilson's Warbler (#54). On the southeastern edge, the cemetery gives way into an undeveloped dirt and weed field. There's a cluster of what I think are tumble pigweed growing on top of a large dirt pile. Often, the local coyotes are up among those weeds, but my dog and I risked it to look for sparrows. And we did find sparrows, but they flushed out of the weeds into private residences. I caught sight of one Vesper (#55) and, when the birds returned, Chipping. Back in the cemetery, I found a Townsend's Warbler (#56), which offered some good looks before flying away.
Elsewhere in west Arapahoe County…
This morning (8/9), I had a brief & noisy visit from a scrub jay.
Great Horns are very active & visible. On Thursday evening, I stopped to photograph one on a low perch, across a field, at Marjorie Perry preserve. As I did this, my dog started pulling on his leash. I checked him and his tail was curled under, in the terror that he usually reserves for encounters with coyote. I looked around to find, instead, a second Great Horn perched about 7 feet up and 7 feet away from us. It had moved in silently. I warily greeted it and it flew off, seeming to drop something when it left. (Moments earlier, I'd heard the rustling of something small in the brush near us. Perhaps the Great Horn got whatever that was.) That night, I woke to one calling in my neighborhood around 1:30 AM. And this morning, my wife and I encountered one screeching from a low & close perch along the Dry Creek Trail in Centennial.
- Jared Del Rosso
Centennial, CO
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