[cobirds] Grandview Cemetery yesterday (4/28/19) in Fort Collins (Larimer)

At Grandview Cemetery (and including nearby Sheldon Lake in City Park) in Fort Collins on 4/28 I had a year-best total of 34 species yesterday.

6 of these were First of the Year (FOY) species for this central Fort Collins complex:

Bufflehead (1 male, historically not at all common at Sheldon Lake)

House Wren (2 near the cemetery entrance, lots of singing and chasing, presumably they will nest along the irrigation ditch somewhere).

Chipping Sparrow (at least 6 seen and heard, lots of "singing", presumably a few pairs will nest in the cemetery spruce trees).

Lincoln's Sparrow (1 under honeysuckle bushes along the ditch, which is currently dry but will receive water soon, south of the entrance).

White-crowned Sparrow (1 adult Gambel's, along the dry ditch south of the entrance.

Green-tailed Towhee (1 seen briefly fairly high in elms near the entrance).

Also of note:

Multiple males and a report of a female Broad-tailed Hummingbird, both in the cemetery and on Frey Avenue one block east.  Photo of male attached shows the unique shape of the wingtip feathers, the source of their distinctive flight whistle.  Note pollen (dandelion?) on the beak tip.  The report of the female was a first for me near Grandview this year.  Nest-building is usually well underway by this date per recent years.  Today's snow will delay things even further.  Since local dandelions are mostly at peak bloom and since next week's onset of seeds are a major component of nests, makes sense females showing up at breeding sites is more in sync with plant phenology than the randy, calendar-reading males (just my guess).

         

Broad-winged Hawk (1 light-phase adult seen twice, both times chased by a Red-tailed Hawk I believe is the male involved in the southeastern cemetery corner nest.  Seen also by John Shenot.).

Pine Siskin first brood already out and about.  House Finch nestlings very vocal of late.  Robins building nests.  American Goldfinches easily amused with elm seeds.  Red-breasted Nuthatches finishing up nest prep.  Starlings cleaning out old cavities. 

Early Barn Swallow returnees investigating historical nest sites but no big numbers of birds and no mud-slinging observed yet.  No cohort Cliff Swallows yet at the intersection of Taft and Laporte Avenues where they usually room together in their under-the-street-and-over-the-ditch niche. 

Creepers and solitaires have been gone to the north or up the hill for a while now.  Juncos essentially gone, if not completely.  Will the cemetery host breeding Ruby-crowned Kinglets, Western Wood-Pewees, Black-chinned Hummingbirds and Lesser Goldfinches this summer?  We shall see.

Dave Leatherman

Fort Collins