[cobirds] Mount Zion Hawk Watch at Windy Saddle Park (28 Sep 2024) 16 Raptors

Mount Zion Hawk Watch at Windy Saddle Park
Golden, Greater Denver, Colorado, USA

This is a new raptor migration site identified and designated so only in mid-September 2024. This is Colorado's 1st fall hawk watch. To get to the site, enter either Windy Saddle Park or Mount Zion into Google Maps on your favorite navigation app, or enter the coordinates 39.7368,-105.2454

Daily Raptor Counts: Sep 28, 2024
Species	Day's Count	Month Total	Season Total
Black Vulture	0	0	0
Turkey Vulture	0	19	19
Osprey	0	3	3
Bald Eagle	0	0	0
Northern Harrier	0	2	2
Sharp-shinned Hawk	1	23	23
Cooper's Hawk	3	45	45
American Goshawk	0	0	0
Broad-winged Hawk	0	14	14
Red-tailed Hawk	4	68	68
Rough-legged Hawk	0	0	0
Swainson's Hawk	0	34	34
Ferruginous Hawk	0	3	3
Golden Eagle	0	2	2
American Kestrel	6	103	103
Merlin	0	0	0
Peregrine Falcon	1	2	2
Prairie Falcon	0	0	0
Mississippi Kite	0	0	0
Unknown Accipiter	0	0	0
Unknown Buteo	0	3	3
Unknown Falcon	0	0	0
Unknown Eagle	0	0	0
Unknown Raptor	1	9	9
Total:	16	330	330

Observation start time:	08:30:00
Observation end time:	12:00:00
Total observation time:	3.5 hours
Official Counter	Ajit Antony
Observers:	Liza Antony

Weather:
Another day with low winds predicted and they came out of the East, with mostly blue skies making it difficult to see migrants in the sky.

Raptor Observations:
I was still not feeling completely well after my COVID vaccine but Liza wanted to go to the top of Mount Zion, but there was a bicycle race in progress up Lookout Mountain Road, and when we got to the Windy Saddle Park parking lot, it was completely full with one car waiting to get in, probably support for the bicyclists, so we used the alternate site on Lookout Mountain Road toward Golden. Many of the raptors were seen through binoculars coming over the Northeast point of Mount Zion,going over the regular hawk watch site and continuing over the western end of Lookout Mountain, probably because of a strong ridge lift from the mild to moderate east winds hitting the ridge. Only 1 CH, the 1st bird of the day at 8:40 AM MST was seen to the east. We did not see any more there in spite of scanning high. I finally figured out that the air was too warm for thermals to develop, so the migrants were using the ridge lift over Mount Zion and Lookout Mountain. In fact, we saw 3 paragliders in the morning who could not get too high as they usually do as there appeared to be not much lift. In the afternoon when the wind became stronger in the last hour far, 3 paragliders again had the same problem; eventually 1 of them used ridge lift and got higher, but when he glided eastward he lost lift immediately and had to come back to the ridge to get higher. 1 of them flew only a little over the road making sharp turns at quite high-speeds. Non-migrant raptors: RT 4

Non-raptor Observations:
American Robin 1, Black-billed Magpie 1, Common Raven 4, Mountain Chickadee 1. Monarch butterfly 1.

Predictions:
Around the same as today. Monday should be interesting with strong NNE changing to NE wind at 10 mph with gusts to 20 mph. I'll be curious to see what raptors will fly, so that will be our next count day.

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Report submitted by Ajit Antony (aiantony@earthlink.net)
More information at hawkcount.org: [Site Profile] [Day Summary] [Month Summary]

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Directions to site:
From I-70 from Northeast Denver, take Route 58, then a left turn going south on
Route 6, the 1st exit is for Lookout Mountain Road, turn right and follow the
clothes to find Windy Saddle Park parking lot on the right.
From I-70 from points west of Denver, take the Lookout Mountain Road and follow
it to the Windy Saddle Park parking lot, a longer route.


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