I took vacation days for the final three days of the week. On Tuesday after work, I walked down to Monument Branch. I shot this Black-billed Magpie on the lawn at Compassion HQ. I know I’ve taken a lot of photos of magpies, but I’m still searching for the perfect shot of the blue and green sheen on their wings and tails. This is close.
Monument Branch isn’t what it used to be. With all the construction going on, there are a lot fewer birds. In the second shot of this Western Wood-Pewee, I though the light through the tail feathers was interesting. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the entire bird in the photo.
Lesser Goldfinch seen on the way home.
On Saturday, Sally and I drove to Lake George and spent three hours in Elevenmile Canyon. At first, we got on the wrong road and happened upon a pond with three American White Pelicans.
When we finally got turned around, we spotted two Clark’s Nutcrackers along the road. These two shots are of the same bird.
Common Mergansers in the South Platte River in Elevenmile Canyon.
Townsend’s Solitaire
We pulled over in a quite stretch of the canyon and ate the picnic lunch Sally prepared. There were many birds around, including this Gray Catbird.
The top two photos are looking upstream and downstream from the spot where we ate lunch.
On Thursday, I drove to southeast Colorado, south of La Junta, to look for Gray Vireos. I’m 60% sure I saw one on County Road 197.6 (really), but it disappeared before I could get a photo or a satisfying look, so I just can’t pull the trigger. The other road where they’ve been seen this spring had aggressive No Trespassing signs, so I skipped it and birded Higbee Valley. It was near midday by this time, so there wasn’t a whole lot of birds around.
Cassin’s Kingbird
Blue Grosbeak
Lark Sparrow
Red-headed Woodpecker
I stopped at Holbrook Reservoir north of Rocky Ford on the way home. I parked on the north side and walked along the shore. There were a few shorebirds and ducks left, but not many. I missed the path to my car on the way back and walked an extra mile, but that’s OK because it led me to my first Colorado Snowy Plover.
Lousy photo but a fun pose
