Do you really need another field guide to North American birds? Yes, you do. In fact, you need two of them—the sooner, the better. How many of your current field guides have entries for the Yellow-bellied Prairie Chicken, the Blunt-billed Woodpecker, or the Split Rail? None of them, I bet.
Do your current field guides explain how to correctly assemble the parts of a bird? I’m sure they don’t. Do you own a book explaining what to say to other birders while on a field trip? No? Well then…
(Be sure to see Bosque Birding, Part 1.)
It was pitch black, and our motel room was uncomfortably cold, despite the noisy heater that had run all night. I groped my way out of bed, half asleep but excited about the coming day. We were in Socorro, New Mexico, just north of the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. In less than an hour, I’d be taking pictures of some 30,000 Snow Geese flying into the dawn sky.
To refresh your memory, here is the photo from February’s Bird Quiz. It was taken in Texas during the month of January. Don’t read any further if you want one last chance to identify this bird.
(Make sure you also see the previous months’ Bird Quizzes!)
Can you identify this bird? The photo was taken during January in Texas. My answer will appear next Monday.
Question: I’m a birder and nature photographer living in Colorado, with a limited budget for travel. Where can I go for fun and photos at this time of year?
Answer: Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge!
Just a day’s drive south of Colorado Springs, Bosque del Apache is the place to go for anyone interested in birds and/or photography. The week we visited, right after New Year’s, the refuge was home to 8,100 Sandhill Cranes, over 32,000 “light” geese, and a whopping 57,000 ducks! With such numbers, spectacular photos are pretty much guaranteed.
The phone rang. It was Debbie, my birding and photography buddy, calling to tell me that a male Eurasian Wigeon had been sighted in Cañon City! She had seen it on the area’s recent Christmas Bird Count, but she’d been without her camera. Now she wanted photographs. Did I want to go back to the area with her to look for it? You bet I did. It isn’t every day a Eurasian Wigeon comes to Colorado!
To refresh your memory, here is the photo from January’s Bird Quiz. It was taken in southeast Colorado during the month of January. Don’t read any further if you want one last chance to identify this bird.
(Make sure you also see the previous months’ Bird Quizzes!)
Once again I’ve put together some birds to identify. As with the birds last year, these won’t be super hard. I’ll show you most, if not all, of the bird, and you should be able to find it in your field guide without too much trouble. Maybe I’m just too chicken to post the pictures that have me stumped!
Can you identify this bird? The photo was taken during January in Colorado. My answer will appear next Monday.
It was cold. Really cold. The car thermometer read -3 (yes, that’s a minus sign) and the wind was howling. That’s what you get when you’re birding at 8,500 feet in the Rocky Mountains at the end of December. Despite four layers of winter clothing, knit hat plus fleece-lined hood, and gloves, I was shivering—and having a tremendous time!
Eight of us set off last Saturday morning for Eleven Mile Canyon, on the west side of Pikes Peak. It was all of 4 degrees as I pulled out of my driveway north of Colorado Springs, but it was early, the sun was out, and I figured it would warm up. So much for being optimistic.
We had a wonderful white Christmas, and the landscape is blanketed in a couple of inches of snow. But with highs below freezing and a predicted low of 10°F tonight, I was naturally concerned about the birds. Early in the morning I bundled up and ventured out to fill my feeders. I added a block of suet to my suet cage, topped off the mesh nyjer feeder, and carried a huge scoop of black oil sunflower seeds to my platform feeder. I assumed the abundant juncos, finches, nuthatches, and chickadees would keep the snow cleared enough to feed. And, for a while, they did.
