Re: [cobirds] epic dawn flight and VisMig, Big Bluestem, The Arsenal, Adams Co., Aug. 1

Great report, Ted!  Thanks for actually using CoBirds to report birds from time to time, as you do. The list has lessened greatly as a place for sharing reports of outings and bird sightings, but your effort here shows how it can shine, even on a summer's day. Summer is definitely not the doldrums in our birding year. 

David Suddjian

Littleton Co

Sent from my iPhone

On Aug 1, 2024, at 10:18 PM, Ted Floyd <tedfloyd73@gmail.com> wrote:



Hey, all. I woke up early, real early, this morning, and was like, Might as well go to The Arsenal. So I did.

Every time I pull in at Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge, Adams Co., I ask myself, "Will this finally be the time I have a boring visit?" Well, my streak of memorable visits to The Arsenal lives on, I am pleased to report. Indeed, this smoky Thurs. morning, Aug. 1, had to be one of my grandest excursions ever to this inarguably greatest birding & natural history hotspot in all of Colorado.

After allowing all the fisherman and photographers to rush in at sunrise (guys, what's the rush??), I tarried just beyond the entrance gate to ponder sunrise on Tatooine:

<01 sunrise.png>

Then I went to the Big Bluestem Trail. It was amazing, maybe the best I've ever seen it, with 14 Brewer sparrows, 270 lark buntings, and a phantasmagoric 35 sage thrashers. At least 6 upland sandpipers went over southbound, as did a brobdingnagian long-billed curlew. And an enchanting badger stared at me through a fretwork of prairie grass:

<03 badger.jpg>

The curlew flight—keep in mind, the upland sandpiper is an exemplary curlew—was just so stirring. Protip: If you use the Merlin Bird ID app (go on! do it! works great!), be sure to examine the sound spectrogram to see whether the machine actually got the ID right. Or ask a friend to do it for you. Heck, you can ask me. (Can we be friends?) I'll refer you to Nathan Pieplow if I don't know. Anyhow, on the output, below, from this morning, you can clearly see the far-carrying "quiddy quit!" flight call of one of the upland sandpipers:

<05 UpSa output.png>

How cool is that!

At the Upper Derby nature trail, there was a surprising least flycatcher. I suppose it could have nested—there're an awful lot of trees back in there; and there's been water all summer. The First Creek crossing on the auto loop had a warbling vireo that I thought sounded good for nominate gilvus, the eastern warbling vireo. No audio, though, so we'll let that one go.

The auto loop proper was fantastic, with a beautiful Krider hawk (Kieran Scnhitzspahn heads straight out the door...), several burrowing owls, at least 600 more lark buntings, and, astoundingly, 4 more upland sandpipers. A couple of the uppies were even on the ground, including this derpy one:

<02 UpSa.jpg>

Rattlesnake Hill had more burrowing owls. Lake Ladora, quite high, had no shorebird habitat to speak of, but odds and ends like family groups of piebald grebes and American coots, plus 3 Virginia rails—a family group, I'm pretty sure, they went OFF when I whistled for a sora. The Havana ponds, despite having seemingly good shorebird habitat, harbored few shorebirds, but the landbirding was decent there: no rarities, but nice diversity and good numbers. Lower Derby had the only black-crowned night-heron of the morning, and I finally met up with a sora at Gun Club Pond. The refuge hq had a broad-tailed hummingbird whaling on a Swainson hawk. Go figure.

Here are a few totals from the morning (all checklists combined, per eBird trip report functionality): 10 upland sandpipers, 10 snowy egrets, 13 western wood-pewees, 31 Say phoebes, 107 western kingbirds, 42 eastern kingbirds, 36 sage thrashers, 15 Brewer sparrows, 18 chipping sparrows (all adults), 113 lark sparrows, 872 lark buntings, and 35 Bullock orioles. The orioles were amazing, most of them out on the prairie, as is their wont in Colorado at this time of the year; they're molt migrants, sojourning at The Arsenal (and elsewhere) before commencing their more familiar fall migration. Here's a blue-footed HY:

<05 BuOr.jpg>

Also a weird towhee and a mystery kingbird—go to eBird for all the inviting details; Art Reisman already stalks me there, and I guess you can, too. 

I made it back to Boulder in time for (a late) lunch!

Ted Floyd
Lafayette, Boulder Co.

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