Larimer Larks

That’s birding for you! Prior to Saturday, our team (Cheri – driver of the perfect, hybrid, Birdathonmobile, Laurie – photographer extraodinaire, Bobbie aka “Eagle Eyes” and me) scouted and strategized and hoped the forecast for wind for Saturday afternoon would be overblown.

By noon’ish, we’d seen 80+ species including a Red-Breasted Merganser at Boyd Lake, a Common Loon at Pinewood, a Brown Thrasher singing from a fence post in the foothills (a first-ever Birdathon bird for us) and one lone Mountain Bluebird. Bullock’s Oriole was our only assurance that spring migrants really were on their way.

We had fun birding at one location with the Serious Sparrows youth team, ages 7 and younger, plus Mom and Dad. Bobbie grabbed a wooden crate so the team could have their first good look at a Black-crowned Night Heron through her scope. At Morey, a cinnamon-colored momma bear and her two cubs were dozing in a cottonwood just west of the trail!

Then the wind picked up. The stronger it blew, the slower the specie count rose. At Arapahoe the wind calmed so that we could see Horned Grebe close-by and Eared Grebe on the other side while a Great-Tailed Grackle pair glided by. That was our last reprieve. At least we had layers of wind clothes with us, unlike the high schoolers in their long pretty prom dresses in various natural areas from Fort Collins to Windsor. Very pretty. But chilling to think of posing still for their parents’ photos.

A flock of Ibis landed in time for Laurie to take a shot out the window. Later scrutiny revealed a Glossy cooperatively standing in front of the pack, with his head up and legs showing darker than the others. A flock of Willets were formation-flying over Carter. Laurie snapped a picture of them too. An improvised late stop at the NE corner of Prospect Ponds added a singing Virginia Rail, a Northern Harrier practically doing cartwheels in the wind – oh I mentioned wind earlier – and a Cooper’s Hawk zipping for cover.

To cap the long day, we found the Neotropic Cormorant trying to roost in the same place as the night before but his egret buddies were not coming in so instead he left in search of them just before a team arrived at their last stop, having started at 2 am that morning! They looked tired.

To be honest, so were we. We headed for home with 98 according to my eBird checklist. Cheri added 4 more by checking her Birdathon historical spreadsheet through the day and Laurie’s pictures added three for a nice round 105, pending COBC judges’ review.