[Douglbirds] Elbert & Douglas

[ouzels8]

Urling and I headed East this morning to survey some Atlas blocks out towards Limon. The East-of-Kiowa ponds along Colo. 86 harbored 100 ducks or so, dabblers. The more easterly pond specialized in plovers: Four Killdeer, 3 Semipalmated Plovers, and one Snowy Plover. Also 4 Spotted Sandpipers. And a Canada Goose.

We found four new species in the Big Gulch Atlas block that we declared Complete last year -- the best a Burrowing Owl in a prairie dog town along Colo. 86

In Limon we saw mostly standard stuff -- the place is crawling with Collared-Doves. We talked to the man with the great yard -- he says lots of birders come by. While we talked he leafed through his Peterson guide and told us all the birds he'd seen (he enters them in the field guide). The Vermilion Flycatcher he mentioned, it turned out, he'd seen in Baja California, not Limon. We did see an Orange-crowned Warbler in his bushes, that and a White-crowned Sparrow his only yard-migrants.

Limon has quite a splendid wetlands, with half a dozen ponds deep enough to house nesting Yellow-headed Blackbirds. We also saw our first-of-the-year Common Yellowthroat there, along with a dozen and a half Wilson's Phalaropes.

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Our Franktown yard seems to pick up one or two new arrivals per day. Here's the litany for May:

May 1    White-throated Sparrow (last seen May 5)
May 4    Black-headed Grosbeak
May 5    Lazuli Bunting
May 6    Plumbeous Vireo, Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, Virginia's Warbler
May 8    Common Poorwill

A neighbor has a flock of Pinyon Jays -- up to 40 -- coming in irregularly, for the first week in May and possibly still showing up. Urling and I haven't managed to lure them up here, less than a half-mile away. 

Hugh Kingery
Franktown, CO 
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