After work on Monday, I wandered along Black Squirrel Creek for a couple hours. The highlight was a pair of Red Crossbills in the pines along one of the ponds. The male sat on an exposed branch for several minutes while I took photos from 40 feet away.
A Cinnamon Teal was preening by the steel bridge. As I was taking photos of it, a Muskrat swam by.
I also scared a couple Wood Ducks out of the trees.
On Wednesday, we took off on a road trip. We grabbed donuts in Canon City, then drove through Bighorn Sheep Canyon to Hayden Creek and back. We got a burger at Big Burger World and ate along the river walk. We took a short walk after eating and I managed to see a Blackpoll Warbler even though I didn’t have my binoculars or camera.
I know it’s normal, but it weirds me out a bit whenever I come across a Wood Duck in a tree like that. It also freaks me out when they go screaming through the woods like somebody just shot their mother.
That’s a great description of their call. It’s one of those bird sounds—like the call of Sandhill Cranes or the rattle of a Belted Kingfisher—that’s so distinct that my brain jumps immediately to the species without going through the process of sorting. The one in the photo was one of two that kept flushing tree to tree in front of me instead of flying to water. I’m not sure I’ve seen that many times before.