[cobirds] Grandview Cemetery in Fort Collins on 2/26 and 2/27/2020 (Larimer)

I visited Grandview Cemetery yesterday with Norm Lewis and returned again today.

Yesterday we struck out on the target Yellow-bellied Sapsucker.  Wintering sapsuckers at Grandview normally leave sometime in March but I believe the adult male is probably still around (last seen on the 22nd).  Not sure about the immature male, last seen a couple weeks ago by John Shenot in the pine that lies on the east side of the ditch just w of the shop building in the se corner of the cemetery.

Interesting birds seen yesterday included a nesting pair of efficient rodent-catching Red-tailed Hawks, a Common Raven making some goofy noises as it flew overhead, a first-of-year-at-Grandview Hairy Woodpecker and a pair of Red Crossbills.  The crossbills sounded typical of our dominant Type 5 "ponderosa" birds but the bills looked very small.  This might indicate they are Type 3 "hemlock" birds that also feed on Douglas-fir, Engelmann spruce and other spruces besides hemlock (a tree which does not occur in the wild in CO and is rarely found in ornamental plantings, botanic gardens and the like).   Also of interest, the male was singing a lot and followed the female every time she flew from tree to tree the way male crossbills do when courting a female.

Today I found this pair in the same area as yesterday (ne corner of Section 1) in the same spruce trees.  I watched them for over an hour stay in one tree, feeding on seeds in cones in the interior of the crown, the male sang off and on, both were seen breaking twigs and for a brief period I noticed the female barely visible within dense branching fussing with/poking/probing white feathers!  Crossbills are known to use feathers for nest liner and I am strongly suspicious this pair is nesting.  The cemetery is well-known for Red Crossbill visitation but nesting would be a first.  The only other crossbill nesting was the famous White-winged Crossbill double brooding that occurred in the winter of 2009-2010 thru early summer 2010.  To be continued, I hope.

                                                                   

I need to record the songs and calls and get a confirmation of the Type.  If they are Type 3, that would be even more special.

Also of interest today was a Downy Woodpecker extracting bark beetles from small branches of Northern Hackberry.  The default bark beetle at Grandview in hackberry is Scolytus muticus.  Discovery of this bark beetle at this site many years ago moved its known range from eastern Nebraska/Kansas to the eastern edge of the CO Front Range, where we all know the East really ends (despite what all the range maps in field guides for various plant and animal groups show).

                                                                             

Dave Leatherman

Fort Collins