Monday, September 4, 2017

Owling In Chaffee and Fremont Counties

September 1-3, 2017

Richard Stevens:

Terry Michaels, Jacob Washburn and I headed to Park County in search of the Long-tailed Jaeger at Antero Reservoir and any owls.  Temperatures were a little cooler than Denver (still in the 80s); winds were 6-8 mph with gusts to 12 mph.  We did not see any of the predicted rainstorms.

September 1

I took about an hour to find the Long-tailed Jaeger at Antero Reservoir (Park County).  We waited until the bird decided to chase some gulls around.  Nothing else uncommon was encountered.

Owling went well in spite of being down to only two of our "owl listening stations" (one was destroyed by an unseen animal last week).

We eventually saw, heard or captured on DVD:
Northern Pygmy-Owl: along Chaffee CR 301 (heard)
Northern Saw-whet Owl: along CR 301 (observed)
Northern Saw-whet Owl (2): Cottonwood Pass (observed)
Northern Pygmy-Owl: Chalk Creek (call captured with "owl listening station"

September 2

In the morning, a brief drive around Buena Vista (Chaffee) found Lewis's Woodpeckers at the City Park (3) and along Pleasant & Princeton Avenues (2).

Two Juniper Titmice were flying around the Buena Vista overlook.  Misses: no Pinyon Jays were found at several previous locations.  Where were they today?

We headed to the Coalmont area of Fremont County.  I have wanted to search for White-tailed Ptarmigan for several years (would be a first county record).

I have made two attempts on Bushnell Peak (13,105 feet) without success.

Today we hiked up Galena Peak (12,461).  Again, we had no success.

Consolation sights were good.  A Townsend's Warbler was seen at Coaldale Campgrounds.  Four American Three-toed Woodpeckers and a pair of Williamson's Sapsuckers were encountered on the hike along Hayden Creek.

On the return trip off Galena Peak, we heard a Boreal Owl near tree line.  Later a Flammulated Owl flew into a tree about 10 yards from us!  Not done yet, a Northern Pygmy-Owl called near the trailhead at Fremont County 6!

September 3

At around 1:00 am we drove up Phantom Canyon (Fremont).  We eventually relocated a Spotted Owl.

As previously written, a friend fixed me up with a radio telemetry antenna.  A few weeks ago, we picked up a signal; however, we were unable to identify what or where it was emitting.

We returned to the proximity again this morning and again picked up a signal.  However, once again we could not determine what the signal was attached.  It was exciting because the signal did move and was above us.  We thought it was surely attached to a bird (or possibly a bat), however nothing was seen flying in the moonlight.

1 comment:

Birder Rich said...

A thought about the telemetry signal moving. Was it a Spotted Owl? It moved too slow to be a bat. We are not aware of anything else being radio tagged in the area?