[Douglbirds] Atlasing Meadowlarks and nuthatches

[Hugh Kingery]

Urling and I spent this morning in our Atlas block north and west of Franktown We tallied 24 species, with 21 of them likely breeders in the block. 

 

The most useful exercise today involved Western Meadowlarks. In a riparian grassland (TTG) section of Cherry Creek, we counted 1 singing birds. By extrapolating to similar sections on the map, we figure 75 singing males along Cherry Creek in the block, and at least 25 others in TTG habitat away from the streambottom . Therefore, we can estimate an abundance of more than 100 breeding pairs (i.e., A4). So - we think you can get a good handle on the number of breeding meadowlarks already, this early in April. According to the about-to-come-out Breeding Codes Manual, we jumped the gun by a week, but it still looks promising as a tool to determine abundance. In fact, a lot of the birds that we saw in the block haven't started nesting yet, either actually or according to that Codes Manual. 

 

We found a pair of magpies exiting a nest (ON) and a Pygmy Nuthatch possibly starting to drill a nest hole (NB) - but we'll have to go back to make sure that he really did intend to dig into the trunk. He hadn't penetrated very deeply yet. 

 

The other rewarding part of today's trip: we found a totally new green belt that leads into some quite good habitat, even as we parked in a suburban neighborhood with cheeping House Sparrows. Western and Mountain Bluebirds have paired up, chickadees are singing, and robins have nesting intentions. A Red-tailed Hawk started sitting on its nest a week ago. 



I expect that any of you can find similar action in your Atlas blocks. And the weather's turned cooperative. 



Hugh Kingery
Franktown, Colorado
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