Some Flicker Fun With WingScapes Bird Cam

The many flickers around my house are doing their twitching, flickering displays toward each other. They are one of my favorite birds!
Flicka-flicka-flicka-wicka-wicka-wicka!
She's not impressed.

Mountain Shadows

We continued further up into the park, stopping at this frozen lake to admire the surrounding beauty. Pam was in the deep snow. The view below the dam. If you look closely, you can see Moose tracks going up the hill.
Perfect moose country. Wrong time of the day. Beautiful, isn't it?
We were so glad to see this sign! Now we knew where we were. Notice the beetle killed trees behind.
We tried hard to understand. WHY?

Kidz & Dogz & Dreadz

The first big dog show of the season happened in Denver recently - The Rocky Mountain Cluster. A four day show hosted by the Plum Creek Kennel Club and Colorado Kennel Club. This was Maggie's first time showing Blaise, one of Pam Gale's lovely Irish Setters. Saturday she placed 2nd, and in the pics below she was placed 1st! A hard earned win as last year her highest placing was second. I love this photo, as you can see her dreads with the dog comb, how she's showing and the judge looking at the class.Moving around the ring. The boy behind her is Shane, also showing one of Pam's dogs.
In the final line up.
This was the Junior Novice class and I loved all these little boys - with a girl on the end.
My Winnie had a good weekend considering the tough competition. Friday and Sunday she went first in her class and Reserve Winners Bitch, just one placing out of points! Saturday and Monday she went 3rd, not so good, but it keeps us coming back! I don't have any picture of Winnie at the show, but here she is the day before.

Colorado State Forest State Park

Not too long ago a friend, Pam, and I took the day for some winter wandering in the Colorado Mountains. One of our first stops was the visitor center at the long named - Colorado State Forest State Park.
This is a very nice center for visitors and they maintain feeders in the back that were frequented by both Mountain and Black-capped Chickadees.
We bought our parks pass and began wandering in earnest. We were hoping to find moose. We didn't, but can you find the Hairy Woodpecker?
Here is one of the spectacular views we enjoyed.
Another guessing game - find the Red Crossbill. It was a treat to see these birds.
Colorado must have some of the best mountain views in the state.
And we're just beginning our trek!

How To Find An Owl - Lesson 1

I'm beginning to wonder if owls are real birds.Now, I've seen owls as the list below reveals, but for me to go out and FIND owls all by myself, well, it just isn't happening. I'm an owl finding dud.
(I wonder if going out alone, on a Thursday afternoon has anything to do with it. Seems to me Owl Finding would be better on a Saturday night, don'tcha think?)

Anyhow, I've been lamenting my lack of owlness to friend and owl meister Scott Rashid. (Check out Scott's new book, Small Mountain Owls!) He thinks it's quite hilarious that I've only seen one Eastern Screech Owl, (snark!) one Long-eared Owl, (cough!) two Barn Owls, one Pygmy Owl, (snort!) one Flammulated Owl (thank you Carol!) many Great Horned Owls (yeah, yeah) one Western Screech Owl (choke!), one Snowy Owl (not too shabby) and one or two Saw-whet Owls (helping Scott band, so do they REALLY count?) - in my life. In probing further into my lack of owlness, after catching his breath and making a few, um, incredulous and unprintable remarks about my lack of skill in this area, realizing I'm dead serious in wanting some help, I get this by email. My first test!

"How to find an Owl:"These two photos © Scott Rashid
After spending far too much time finding the owls and MAKING SURE of the numbers of owls in the pictures, I sent him my guess and received this reply: "Perfect, I knew you could do it."
(what's YOUR guess?)
In a picture maybe, but how about in real life?
So we went out together not long ago, mainly intent on finding the Snowy Owl that's visiting Colorado, but also to drive though and study habitat, listen to Scott wax eloquent on his owl finding adventures, and get out and look for owls - our main target of the day after the delightful Snowy were Long-eareds. We didn't find any that day, but I did get a good start to understanding owl habitat. And a really nice LOOOOONG walk alongside a very long stand of junipers.
So, generously, Scott took me out for another installment in my "Owlducation". We had heard of Short-eared Owls nearby and went looking for them first. Below are two pictures of prime Short-eared Owl wintering habitat.Nice habitat, but no Short-eareds today. So on we went out east into the Prairie, intent on discovering good Long-eared Owl habitat. Look, here's some.Thick brushy areas surrounded by miles of open prairie. They seem fond of human-planted juniper stands.Especially fond of dense thickets like this one. There are SIX Long-eared Owls in this picture!One..
Two..
This one flew to a cottonwood tree. It's so fascinating to see how well they blend in!

Four.
Is that a lovely intense face or what? A couple of the owls stayed in parts so dense all we could find were hints of their presense. It was such a great experience to spend time with these owls and begin to get a grasp on where they like to be and when.
We soaked up all the owlness we could stand for the moment and softly walked away, leaving them to their dense safe thicket in the prairie.

Little Feeties - Winter's Guessing Game

Little Bitsy Leaping Mouse Tracks

We have had a lot of snow this winter. I mean - I don't think I've seen the grass much except in the last two weeks. Then we get fresh snow on top of old snow. I get it if we're Minnesota, but we're Colorado - you know- the snowed one day (maybe two) then forties the rest of the month state?

Anyhow, enough whining. One thing I love about winter is the little critters with little feet can't be so sneaky about it. Like this little Mouse with a tail that bounded across from patio to feeder. Look here: Bird feetie frenzy - Juncos and Flickers.These little marks were left by our resident fox squirrel. Each set of tracks were spaced over a foot apart. Leaping squirrels.
I think there was a serious clean up crew here - Flickers Foraging For Bits Of Food.
Oh, oh, oh. Who is this now? And why do these tracks (barely the size of a quarter) go from feeder to feeder to feeder to feeder? 'Cause Foxes will eat anything and have a particular fondness for suet nuggets.
I love this - another mass meeting of feeting. Mostly Flicker feet.
The Junco Dance PartyCute little Junco feet and something else.
A Junco on an afternoon walk.And the sweet brush of a wing on the snow.