Rocky Mountain High

I couldn’t sleep well Wednesday night. I was way too excited about the birds and sites I was about to see in my new location. I finally got up at about 6am and got going before the Chase-Jacobsens awoke. As soon as I left the house, two COMMON RAVENS were flying and squawking overhead.

My first stop was a Boulder Mountain Park- Shadow Canyon. The minute I got there, I was hearing odd things. As I hiked the foothills, I started picking up some birds that I new from the east- EASTERN TOWHEE, DARK-EYED JUNCO (but the grey-headed subspecies), and WHITE-CROWNED SPARROW. It wasn’t too long before new things started jumping out. At this point, I was equal times looking at the birds as scanning my Peterson Western Birds field guide. By about 30 minutes into my hike, I had seen GREEN-TAILED TOWHEE, BLACK-BILLED MAGPIE, STELLER’S JAY, MOUNTAIN and WESTERN BLUEBIRDS, and the beautiful Audubon’s YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLER. Much like the DICKCISSEL from the other day, I spent far too long in the sparrow section before finally identifying a lifer PINE SISKIN. After about a two-mile walk, I decided to head back to my car, since I had no water. On the way back, a ROCK WREN presented himself and started singing to me.

I then headed up to the mountains, and stopped in the Roosevelt National Forest, at the where it was lightly snowing on me. I went for a short hike on the Ceran St. Vrain trail, where I came across a MOUNTAIN CHICKADEE and RED-BREASTED NUTHATCH in my binoculars at the same time. While looking at a pack of YELLOW-RUMPED WARLBERS, I asked myself if it was worth methodically checking them. Within a minute, it decidedly was. I noticed an awesome looking male TOWNSEND’S WARBLER.

After a long day, I headed back to the house and planned out my next day. At about 6pm, Mark and Jaylynne invited me out to an Asian stir-fry restaurant with, which reminded me of Mama Fu’s. After that we stopped at Trident for a coffee, and we walked along the downtown Pearl Street Mall.

This morning I couldn’t sleep well either, but managed to stay in bed until about 6:30. After an awesome breakfast of oatmeal with fresh peaches, pecans, dates, and flax, I headed to another Boulder Mountain Park, this time it was Gregory Canyon. I started birding in a riparian area, where I noticed two WILSON’S WARBLERS gallivanting, if birds can do that. Then I headed up the hill, which was pretty steep. At the “Amphitheater”, there was a calling BROWN CREEPER, creeping. I headed back down the same way I came, and although it may have only been about a half mile each way, I started to sympathize with how Rosana and the gang felt in the Grand Canyon.

I drove out to the Boulder Reservoir, which I had quickly looked at yesterday in the wind and rain. Today was much better, and I went to a birdier part of it. Along the shore were tons of gulls. Someone had posted a FRANKLIN’S GULL here from the other day. I came guns blazing ready to try to separate him from the LAUGHING GULLS, but didn’t have to. After looking over all of the gulls with black heads, there were no LAUGHING GULLS! They were all FRANKLIN’S, which made my life easy.

In a pasture in the reservoir’s park, I saw something that looked like a robin, but was unsure. When I got closer, I tried to make him a TOWNSEND’S SOLITAIRE, but it just was not. He let me get really close, and I was able to determine his reality to be that of a SAY’S PHOEBE, a lifer for me.

In the afternoon, I headed to the Walden Ponds, where one of the ponds was filled with geese and ducks. The lighting and distance was great for being able to identify all that was in there, which included PIED-BILLED GREBE, CANADA GOOSE, AMERICAN WIGEON (males in fantastic plumage), REDHEAD, and RING-NECKED DUCK.

I’m a bit sun and wind-burned and pretty tired. Since it’s been a few days since I’ve had a beer, and I’m in the hotbed of microbrewification, I may have to have a celebratory one before bed.