Tuesday, June 14, 2016

Birding Northern Jefferson County Back to Adams County

June 12, 2016

Richard Stevens:

It rained rather hard last night and grasses were quite wet behind the Apex Center in Arvada (Jefferson).  Winds were 8mph and temperatures hovered around 62 degrees when we arrived at 7:00 am.

No Bobolinks were insight during the first 20 minutes we scanned the field behind the recreation center.  When the sun hit the field birds started to emerge from the tall grass.

Eventually Rebecca and I saw four male Bobolinks and one female.  Several times male Bobolinks flew close to us.  They were more interested in the female than us.  Was the female trying to use us to ward off the males?

Later we stopped at the Van Bibber Trail and relocated one of the two Eastern Screech-Owls, residents in the area.

Our next stop was Two Ponds National Wildlife Refuge.  The Refuge has some brilliant and diverse habitat.  This includes thick riparian areas, several ponds with dense undercover and cattail marshes, and wide-open Prairie grasslands.

We would expect the bird checklist here to be much bigger than it is.  Perhaps the lack of birder visits accounts for the short bird list?

Only three uncommon birds were found.  However, a Yellow-billed Cuckoo was a great find for us!  The cuckoo was in the northeastern corner of the wildlife refuge. 

Note: we decided not to report it to the birding community to keep down disturbance to the bird.  We did send a text message to half a dozen birders hoping they would witness the sighting for us.  Unfortunately, we have not heard of additional reports (as of 6/14).

Two Bushtits were carrying nesting material and shoring up a nest along the north side of the property.

After breakfast, we drove through the Rocky Mountain Arsenal (Adams).  The Eastern Phoebe was perched just below 6th avenue at the Potomac Street canal. We again missed relocating any Blue Grosbeaks.

We then rushed home at temperatures were rising.

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