Blue was the color of the sky. Blue were the wing-flashing highlights on the magpies flapping overhead. Blue infused the back of the perching scrub-jay. And a wave of blue washed over me when I couldn’t manage a decent photo of my first Utah warbler sighting: a Nashville Warbler flitting through the scrub oak. A fairly uncommon migrant, from what I gather.

But here’s a photo of a scrub jay.

Grandeur Peak Area List
Beginning at 8:45 a.m., I hiked a few hundred feet up the mountain.

1. Black-billed Magpie*
2. House Finch*
2. Spotted Towhee
3. Black-capped Chickadee
4. Blue-gray Gnatcatcher (v)
5. Woodhouse’s Scrub-jay**
6. Song Sparrow** (v)
7. Northern Flicker
8. Nashville Warbler

Elsewhere

11. Eurasian Collared Dove
12. California Quail
13. House Sparrow
15. Rock Pigeon
16. Lesser Goldfinch

v = Voice only
*Also elsewhere
**Voice only elsewhere