Week Eleven got off to a phenomenal start on the 10th, with a day spent birding my way east through Colorado from my starting point of Montrose. While the day would prove to be among the birdiest of the week, it definitely didn’t start that way at my first spot. The Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park South Rim Campground is a known reliable location for Dusky Grouse, and while there hadn’t been any reported there yet this year I figured that, with Greater Sage-Grouse having been lekking in Utah, it was possible that I could luck out if I tried for them there. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t even get the opportunity to try for them, as upon arriving at the National Park I found that the campground was closed down and blocked off – whether there were birds there yet or not, no attempt to find them would be possible.
With this failed (or more accurately not even attempted) effort in the birds, I decided to head east towards the town of Gunnison itself, where I hoped to track down a Gunnison Sage-Grouse. Unfortunately these are a remarkably hard to come by bird unless you pay to get onto a private-access Lek (and even there they may not have been lekking yet), but I have heard in the past that you can have hit-or-miss success driving along Airport Road. My experience can be added to the “miss” category.
Both birds had certainly been long shots, but the back-to-back dips certainly kicked my Monday off in disheartening fashion – thankfully, however, my fortunes would change in the coming hours.
My next stop of the day came at the Big Bend Recreation Site, a brief stop that didn’t bring any new state birds, but a few minutes later at the Big Bend State Wildlife Area that would change with my first Northern Shrike I have seen all year. Just a half mile farther down the road I would hear a calling Marsh Wren at the Chaffee CR 163 pond, and spot a Rough-legged Hawk and a pair of Horned Lark just past the pond after leaving. Mount Ouray State Wildlife Area didn’t bring anything noteworthy, but Frantz Lake State Wildlife Area was extremely bountiful, hosting not only my Colorado-first Cackling Goose but also my first-of-year American Tree Sparrow. Finally this string of short stops came to an end at the Sands Lake State Wildlife Area, which was absolutely packed with ducks including a Barrow’s Goldeneye, and underneath the nearby bridge over the rocky stream I spotted an American Dipper actively “dipping” through the water.
My next stop, despite not being at an eBird Hotspot, proved to be arguably my best stop of my time in Colorado. Seeing some reports of a few birds I needed from a stretch of roads just north of the Poncha Springs/Salida area, I drove north. Upon arriving I discovered these checklists were not coming from a backcountry rural road like I’d assumed, but instead a very nice, mostly-pinewoods neighborhood known as Mesa Antero. I spent nearly two hours driving the vast, spread-out neighborhood and watching a few sets of feeders, and the haul proved to be well worth the time invested. Almost immediately upon arriving I was greeted by an abundance of Pygmy Nuthatch and Pine Siskin. After a bit of driving I spotted a Townsend’s Solitaire and before long found myself at the first set of feeders I would spend some time at. There I immediately heard and then spotted a small flock of Evening Grosbeak as well as a small mixed-flock of finches including Cassin’s Finch, House Finch, Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch, and my Lifer Brown-capped Rosy-Finch. I spent another hour or so driving the neighborhood after moving on from this set of feeders, but the only new bird I added for Colorado was my second-ever Clark’s Nutcracker. At one point I thought I heard a couple calling Canada Jay, however I was unable to locate them and am not comfortable enough with Jay calls to ID them from that alone.
I made two lasts stop on Monday; first a visit to the Temple Canyon Park, where – quite suitably considering the name – I added Canyon Wren and Canyon Towhee to my Colorado list, and second a quick scan of the Cañon City Valco Pond, which didn’t have anything of note. From there I decided to head up to the south Colorado Springs area and settle in for the night at the Fountain, CO Walmart parking lot. where I started Tuesday morning with Great-tailed Grackle and Ring-billed Gull before heading to the Big Johnson Reservoir & Bluestem Prairie Open Space, a spot which I hoped could push me to 100 for Colorado, though I only added four of the roughly-dozen birds I’d hoped to pick up there. Still, Horned Grebe, Red-breasted Merganser, California Gull, and American Herring Gull were all solid additions to my state tally, which now sat at 92.
The Fountain Creek Regional Park helped bring me even closer to the century-mark. At the Nature Center portion of the park I heard a calling Virginia Rail and spotted a Cooper’s Hawk terrorizing the feeders, and upon heading south to the main portion of the park I heard a Brown Creeper and spotted a pair of Blue Jay. From Fountain Creek I headed to the Kane Ranch Open Space. Immediately upon arriving I spotted a shrike which I initially called – and still suspect was probably – a Loggerhead Shrike, however in hindsight I believe it’s probably more appropriately left as a “slash” as I didn’t get a good enough look at it to definitively rule out Northern Shrike. I did, however, spot a few more new birds at Kane Ranch, including Ladder-backed Woodpecker, Curve-billed Thrasher and Sage Thrasher – bringing me to 99 for Colorado (though initially I had thought I was at 100 with the inclusion of Loggerhead Shrike.) After departing Kane Ranch I made a quick stop by the Squirrel Creek Road Reservoir, which held a small assortment of ducks, and then headed to a Starbucks to get started on a project that would occupy much of the next couple days.
I spent nearly all of Tuesday afternoon and evening as well as nearly all of Wednesday working on my laptop. In fact, on Wednesday I only submitted two eBird checklists all day: one an incidental for a Red-tailed Hawk I drove by on my way to revisit the Big Johnson Reservoir, and one at said reservoir, where I would add a trio of birds I missed the previous day in Double-crested Cormorant, Eared Grebe, and Prairie Falcon. I then spent nearly all day working on organizing all of my contacts and planning information for the year, as well as creating a few useful spreadsheets and talking with my insurance company regarding the accident from Week Ten; to see said spreadsheets check out my Status Update post from 3/11!
The 13th was, in the scheme of the year, a day with much less birding – but unlike the 12th I did still spend the morning birding. First I visited the Blodgett Peak Open Space, then the Kettle Lakes, followed by Fox Run Regional Park and Black Forest Regional Park, and lastly the Forest Lake Park and Reservoir. None of these stops were particularly noteworthy, but I did see a few Cedar Waxwing at Black Forest. I then spent a couple hours finishing up last week’s blog post before spending the evening finishing up my electronic organization and getting started on some physical reorganizing of my car.
Friday would be a return-to-form of the birding that most of this year has entailed, as I met Peter Burke of Rocky Mountain Birding for a morning spent around the prairies northeast of the Denver area. We headed out from his home in Boulder well before dawn in order to arrive at our first stop – a lekking site for Greater Prairie-Chicken – and our timing was impeccable as we located a pair of the funky little birds displaying nearly immediately upon arrival. We spent close to an hour watching the adorable birds do their display, eventually determining there were at least eight of them in the area, and Peter spotted a distant Great Horned Owl on a nest off to the east. The rest of our morning was spent driving to and doing a brief loop through the Pawnee National Grasslands, which – despite it definitely not being the ideal time of year for birding there – was still a neat experience to drive through.
The grasslands were replete with raptors – primarily Red-tailed Hawk, American Kestrel, and Northern Harrier, but we also spotted a Ferruginous Hawk, which was new for me for Colorado. Unfortunately the weather turned sour and we made the decision to call it an early day, as the rain turned many of the prairie’s clay-based-dirt roads into precarious passageways and the remarkable winds reached speeds that caused most birds to simply hunker down and wait it out. And so, shortly before noon, we arrived back at Peter’s house and I left to head south – unfortunately making the abysmally bone-headed mistake of forgetting to take a photo with Peter or have him sign my field guide – both things I try to do with every person I bird with this year. Hopefully I will be able to remedy the latter at least in the fall, as I will be in the Pacific Northwest at the same time as Peter is leading a birding field tour there, and maybe I will be able to meet up with him and have him sign my field guide.
After parting ways with Peter I started working my way back south, with my first stop being not a birding stop but still an essential one: picking up a couple containers of Flatiron Pepper Company pepper flakes. For years now that’s been a predominant staple of me, my parents’, and my brothers’ cabinets, however so far this year I have been forced to endure without any – and having only ever previously bought it online I hadn’t even considered that I could remedy until Peter was telling me about the mountains to the west as we headed back to Boulder – including a formation known as The Flatirons. This made me wonder if Flatiron Pepper was based in the area (they are), and from there I looked into if any local stores carried their products (some do), and so I made sure to swing by a store to get some.
With this previous tragedy (that maybe even rivaled my much-needed root canal or the car accident in Salt Lake City) now remedied, I spent some time driving the neighborhoods around West Pueblo in search of Scaled Quail, eventually tracking down a small group of them. From there I headed to Lake Pueblo State Park, where I spent an hour scanning from the South Marina area in hopes of picking up any of the birds that had been recently reported there that I still needed for Colorado, but unfortunately was unable to see any Lesser Black-backed Gull, Great Black-backed Gull, Iceland Gull, or the Red-necked Grebe seen just a few days earlier. I did have one gull I think may have been a first cycle Thayer’s Iceland Gull, but, well… ugh, Gull ID, am I right? I did, however, see a group of Wild Turkey shortly after leaving the park, which finalized my Colorado list at 108 species.
On Saturday I began the long drive to Albuquerque, and didn’t actually visit a single eBird Hotspot all day. I did, however, pick up a new addition to my New Mexico list when I spotted the distinct profile of a Black-billed Magpie in flight from the highway shortly after crossing the state line. Once I arrived in Albuquerque I spent the rest of Friday hanging out with my brothers Tyler and Ben, as well as their friend Connor.
Saturday would be the only day in this trip to New Mexico where I did any real birding; after sleeping in a bit later than planned I headed up into the mountains to make another visit to Sandia Crest, this time hoping to locate Brown-capped Rosy-Finch for my New Mexico list, as well as hoping to finally track down an American Three-toed Woodpecker – the last of the extant breeding woodpeckers of the ABA that I still need for my year and life lists. Upon arriving to the crest I spotted a group of people breaking down some banding equipment, and after introducing myself to them I spent some time chatting with one of them, a local birder and bander named Jason. From Jason I learned two things: first, there almost certainly were no Brown-capped Rosy-Finches at Sandia Crest this year, with most reports of them likely being misidentifications – bummer. The second piece of information, however, would prove to be incredibly helpful, as Jason described in detail exactly where I should go to try for the woodpecker.
So, after spending a bit of time watching the feeders at Sandia Crest, I started working my way down the mountain to the 10k North Trailhead, and from there followed the trail a short distance to small burn clearing which has been hosting the birds for quite a while. It didn’t take long for me to first hear, and then see, one of my targets, and with the addition of American Three-toed Woodpecker to my Life List I have now seen every single ABA Woodpecker this year! From there I continued working my way down the mountain with several short stops at the Capulin Spring Picnic Site, the Balsam Glade, and the Tree Spring Trailhead. None of these stops were especially noteworthy, but at Balsam Glade I did see a pair of Steller’s Jay, which my dad and I somehow managed to miss during my January visit to New Mexico. My next substantial stop was at the Doc Long Picnic Area, where my dad and I had seen my Lifer Williamson’s Sapsucker back in January – and where I spotted a pair of them on this visit! Also at Doc Long I heard and saw a couple Red Crossbill, as well as an assortment of various common birds.
From Doc Long I worked my way back to Albuquerque to spend the rest of my day with my brother Tyler at his apartment, making a quick stop at the Carlito Springs Open Space on the way. That concluded my birding for Week Eleven – and for all intents and purposes my birding for New Mexico until later this year when I revisit the state, likely in November or December. Next week I will head into Kansas, dip up to Nebraska, and then return to Kansas – along the way dealing with a true blizzard which has derailed my Wednesday birding plans – though is nearly entirely responsible for this post coming out on time as I have spent the last three hours sitting in a Starbucks writing it instead of out birding. But that’s a story for next week – and in the meantime, Happy Birding!
eBird Trip Summary:
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Follow me on my journey to see 100 species in every Lower-48 State during 2025, experience some of the incredible places and events in American birding, and meet and bird with as many local birders as possible along the way.
Posts will be made every Wednesday (I will try to have them out by 5pm, but situationally they might be a bit later) and will cover the previous Monday through Sunday. Additional posts will be made periodically with no set schedule.
