On my morning hike with dog this day I heard, at a distance, a warbler’s song I’d never heard before. I felt sure it was a warbler from my years of listening to birds of all kinds: Warblers make sounds from a certain set that other birds don’t seem to have access to. This one sang a series of individual buzzy notes varying in number by one or two. I wondered what its name was.

As we headed down a deer trail in the general direction of the song, it began to fade as the bird moved quickly away and up Coyote Canyon. I figured I’d missed my chance. But up the canyon a ways, I heard again this distinctive song, much nearer, and began to track its source. Took a while, but I finally found it: a Black-throated Gray Warbler.

I’ve heard the voices of many black-throated grays, and all but one sang quite similar buzzy songs—much unlike this bird. (The outlier sang a different, buzzy jumble of notes whose order I can’t remember.) In fact, while chasing the singer of today’s mystery song, I even wondered aloud at one point: “Could it be a black-throated gray?”

But despite the fact that I’d seen the bird—that it wasn’t some strange new species—it was a thrill to add a new bit of information to my meager knowledge of the wondrous Great Outdoors.

Grandeur Peak Area List
Beginning at 7:28 a.m. (8:28 MDT), I hiked a few hundred feet up a mountain.

1. Lazuli Bunting
2. Black-headed Grosbeak (v)
3. Black-capped Chickadee
4. Song Sparrow* (v)
5. Black-chinned Hummingbird
6. Warbling Vireo
7. Blue-gray Gnatcatcher
8. American Robin*
9. Spotted Towhee
10. Western Tanager
11. House Finch**
12. Rock Pigeon
13. Mourning Dove
14. Pine Siskin
15. Chipping Sparrow
16. Cooper’s Hawk
17. Black-throated Gray Warbler
18. Orange-crowned Warbler (v)
19. Black-billed Magpie*
20. California Quail* (v)
21. Lesser Goldfinch** (v)

Elsewhere

22. European Starling
23. Eurasian Collared-dove

Mammals

Rock Squirrel

(v) Voice only
*Also elsewhere
**Voice only elsewhere