ESTESBOG

BIRDING AND NATURE LIST FOR MORGAN COUNTY AND VICINITY JULY 19-26, 2009

What would you get if you crossed a lark sparrow with a meadowlark? Whatever it might be, it would probably look quite a lot like a dickcissel. Dickcissels were this week’s stars in northeast Colorado. This sparrow-sized bird with a big voice has puzzled taxonomists for years. The species apparently evolved to take advantage of temporary weed patches left in the wake of the enormous herds of wandering bison. As the plains ecosystem was altered by man, dickcissels adapted. They have a strong affinity for alfalfa fields. But they remain more or less nomadic, here one year and totally absent the next five or ten. July, 2009 marked the largest incursion of dickcissels in this part of the Great Plains since at least the 1970s. The males can be found on power lines overlooking alfalfa or shrubby habitats. They have at least two loud songs, both manifestations of “dickcissel” – one buzzy and one clearly whistled.

 

The week’s nature list is as follows:

 

Birds:

 

Canada goose

Wood duck

Gadwall

Mallard

Blue-winged teal

Redhead

Wild turkey, Rio Grande subspecies

Northern bobwhite

Pied-billed grebe

American white pelican

Double-crested cormorant

American bittern

Great blue heron

Turkey vulture

Mississippi kite

Swainson’s hawk

Red-tailed hawk

Ferruginous hawk

Northern harrier

American kestrel

American coot

Killdeer

Greater yellowlegs

Spotted sandpiper

Baird’s sandpiper

Wilson’s snipe

Ring-billed gull

Rock pigeon

Eurasian collared-dove

Mourning dove

Barn owl

Burrowing owl

Common nighthawk

Chimney swift

Belted kingfisher

Red-headed woodpecker

Downy woodpecker

Northern flicker

Western wood-pewee

Western kingbird

Eastern kingbird

Say’s phoebe

Loggerhead shrike

Warbling vireo

Blue jay

Bank swallow

Northern rough-winged swallow

Cliff swallow

Barn swallow

Black-capped chickadee

House wren

American robin

Northern mockingbird

Brown thrasher

European starling

Yellow warbler

Common yellowthroat

Spotted towhee

Cassin’s sparrow

Brewer’s sparrow

Lark sparrow

Lark bunting

Grasshopper sparrow

Blue grosbeak

Dickcissel

Red-winged blackbird

Yellow-headed blackbird

Western meadowlark

Common grackle

Great-tailed grackle

Brown-headed cowbird

Bullock’s oriole

House finch

American goldfinch

House sparrow

 

Mammals:

 

Eastern cottontail

Fox squirrel

Pronghorn

 

Whitetail deer

 

Herptiles:

 

Bullfrog

Lesser earless lizard

Northern leopard frog

Plains blackhead snake

Western rattlesnake

Woodhouse’s toad