Owling and Cherry Creek Reservoir

September 11, 2007

We starting owling around midnight as I wanted to check several private ranches (invitation only) and still wanted to be a Flagler Reservoir (Kit Carson) about an hour before sunrise.

We estimated to have only 4 hours of walking time and checked the wildlife areas Knudson (Logan), Dune Ridge (Logan), Overland Trail (Logan), Atwood (Logan), and Messex (Logan) before picking up hwy 63 to hwy 36 to hwy 59. This route passes several state lands and private ranches that I had previously obtained permission to walk.

Owl count from four private ranches turned up only one Eastern Screech-Owl in Logan County. Overland Trail turned up another Eastern Screech-Owl. We briefly saw a Barn Owl flying in front of our car as we drove to Messex Wildlife Area. We did record some nice "night bird migration sounds"!

No Short-eared Owls flew around the north end of Flagler Reservoir the hour before sunrise. After sunrise, we walked the southern, eastern and northeastern corners of Flagler Reservoir. A Northern Waterthrush was walking around at the southeast corner. A Red-bellied Woodpecker worked the tall cottonwoods at the northeast corner.

Below the dam we found a MacGillivray's Warbler. While trying to determine the sex of the MacGillivray's Warbler we discovered another gray headed warbler which turned out to be a male Nashville Warbler (yellow throat, yellow undertail coverts, bluish gray head, nice complete white eye-ring).

Tired, we headed back to Denver. After a few hours of sleep, I woke up at 3:00pm and read Glenn Walbek’s report from Cherry Creek Reservoir (Arapahoe). Then I quickly headed over there. It took about 45 minutes to pick out the Red Phalarope that Glenn found earlier in the day.

Afternoon light from the swim beach is a killer. One almost looks directly into the setting sun. It requires moving around to scope areas where the sun is not directly in your scope. Unfortunately, the west side of the reservoir is too far away to scope the swim beach area.

Many boats pulling skiers were out on this warm fall day. That is a disadvantage when looking for water birds. However, one advantage was that they kept kicking up the gulls. One of the Sabine's Gulls also reported earlier by Glenn was forced to get off the water and flew over my head (I was at the swim beach. By the way, the Red Phalarope was northwest of the swim beach about 80 yards off the shore).

Walking back to my car, I came upon two flocks of birds around the Smoky Hill Group Picnic Area. One flock consisted of 40+ Chipping Sparrows most of which were juvenile birds. The smaller second flock consisted of 7 Yellow-rumped Warblers, 2 Black-capped Chickadees, and a Cassin's Vireo. This flock was first encountered northwest of the picnic area and moved south of it (around 5:30pm).

A check of the Cottonwood Creek Loop, Lake Loop, and southwest marina did not turn up the second summer Lesser Black-backed Gull reported by Glenn. No Common Terns reported yesterday by Steve Kennedy, but I did see 2 Black Terns. No unusual shorebirds today were on the eastern sand spit. There was one Great Egret and about 15 Snowy Egrets (another 17 encountered on other parts of the reservoir).