This morning’s hike with Jack was a little different, in that we traveled in a group of four humans and four dogs. The dogs were friendly and well-behaved, and the humans were looking for wild birds.
And wild birds were found. Not everyone saw every species, but there were plenty to choose from—including two first-of-year (to me) birds: Violet-green Swallow and Gray Flycatcher. (I’d thought at first the flycatcher was a lifer, but turns out I spotted my first last May.) Was a fun time.
Tomorrow will be a summerlike day, so they say. Very likely the best spring migration birding in the week or two to come.
[Aside: Tomorrow afternoon I’m scheduled to give a Zoom slideshow presented by Coastal Mountains Land Trust, facilitated by the Camden (Maine) Public Library, comparing and contrasting the birds and other wildlife of coastal Maine and the Wasatch range. Fun!]
Grandeur Peak Area List Beginning at 7:30 a.m. (8:30 MDT), I hiked a few hundred feet up a mountain.
It’s really starting to feel like spring. Early spring, perhaps, but the warmer air today, bright sun, new leaves, and slight uptick in birdsong were convincing.
Singers down in the neighborhood and up on the deer trails. An Eastern Sunday cottontail in the old quarry. Even this evening in the yard, a solitary Cooper’s Hawk on a utility line.
As happens nearly every night, I can’t help but what tomorrow brings.
Grandeur Peak Area List Beginning at 7:49 a.m. (8:49 MDT), I hiked a few hundred feet up a mountain.
On a dramatically overcast morning, dog and I climbed the trail we’ve climbed for going on 500 straight days, and there we found a bunch of birds with lovin’ on their minds. Two solitaires duking it out with song; scrub-jays hollering at each other; a titmouse calling from the tip of a juniper; finches pairing up two by two.
Also spied a Mountain Cottontail nibbling on grass, and from across the gulch a Rock Squirrel delivering its loud, repetitive call.
In afternoon, a patch of snow rolled through, but still the Song Sparrow in the little yard sang brightly, hopefully.
Grandeur Peak Area List Beginning at 8:16 a.m. (MST), I hiked a few hundred feet up a mountain.
