[cobirds] BBS routes, Larimer and Weld counties

I completed two breeding bird survey routes this past week, one in Larimer County along Buckhorn Canyon road and over Pennock Pass, and one in Weld county, traversing the Central Plains Experimental Range and the Pawnee National Grasslands.

First the grasslands route, which I completed on Monday. Numbers for most species seemed about average, if not slightly lower than average for lark buntings, and above average for Cassin's sparrows. At one stop I had as many as seven Cassin's sparrows singing within earshot!  McCowns longspurs were also somewhat above average in numbers, as were Brewers sparrows, which I'm never quite sure if their upticks are simply due to higher detectability in years when lark bunting numbers are lower, as their song can be hard to pick out amongst the so of lark buntings.  Other species of note observed include a single burrowing owl, numerous horned larks, swainsons hawks, ferriginous hawks, common nighthawks, mourning doves, western and eastern kingbirds, western wood-pewees, loggerhead shrikes, western meadowlark, grasshopper sparrows, lark sparrows, and a single mockingbird at the CPER headquarters. Brown thrashers, which are sometimes fairly common in the scattered tree/hedge rows along this route, were not observed.  

A brief stop at some ponds along county rd 122 yielded some singing pied-billed grebes, among various waterfowl species.  A late morning jaunt through crow valley campground yielded a migrant swainsons thrush and a 'western' flycatcher this Bengia June 4th), among the several orchard orioles and other breeders.  Surprisingly no chats were singing, and no grosbeaks.  

The montane route, which I completed on Tuesday, was more interesting. Normally this route has a lot of noise from the creek but this year there was less water, and I also did the route nearly 2 weeks earlier than usual. Birds were numerous in the canyon, especially Macgillivray's warblers, broad tailed hummingbirds, warbling vireos and hammond's flycatchers (in the adjacent pine forest, but also in aspen groves). Of particular interest were two ovenbirds heard singing at two different stops plus Swainsons thrush singing at two stops.  This latter species I have never had before in this canyon,  although I have wondered why not, given the habitat.  The ovenbirds were found at 1.5 and 2.2 miles up the canyon from the paved road (stove prairie road), and the swainsons thrushes were at similarly low elevations.  Also of note was a band-tailed pigeon seen flying high overhead, a species I last saw there over 10 years ago.  Other birds of interest that were common along the route included Wilsons Warbler, Western Tanager, Lazuli bunting, and Green-tailed towhee, among others. In the past I have had kno willow flycatcher in the willow carrs before pennock pass, but not this year.  Dusky flycatchers were present there, however.

Later in the day I spent some time in the Jack's Gulch campground area in the High Park fire burn area, where there was an olive-sided flycatcher and an eastern bluebird singing persistently most of the afternoon, along with a dusky flycatcher enjoying the young aspen regrowth.  

Good birding,

Arvind Panjabi

Larimer County 

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