Yard Surprise

I got up this morning and found this deer with her fawn in my yard. I get a lot of deer in my yard but I have never had a fawn. This was shot through the sliding glass door. It came out better than I thought after a small Photoshop adjustment. Please ignore the weeds.

Spring Review Part 3

On May 18th a Tricolored Heron was reported at Holcim Wetlands in Fremont county. I had never heard of Holcim Wetlands so I was excited to find the heron in a new location. Once I was there it took about 40 minutes before I saw the bird fly into open water and I was able to get some photos with rather poor lighting conditions.



I returned on May 19th and Tricolored Heron was still there. I also found this Curve-billed Thrasher and finally got a quick shot of the local Common Yellowthroat.

Holcom Wetlands is a shallow gravel pit cattail marsh. At this location you have access to the marsh, a river and a canal between the marsh and the river. In two short visits I located 21 species of birds, two species of lizards and one huge toad. Im my opinion this is now one of the premier spots in Fremont County.

Spring Review Part 2

Just about a month after the Yellow-crowned Night-heron another rare visitor, a Common Black-hawk, arrived to the same park. Common Black-hawks are typically found in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. They rarely go as far north as Colorado.

Common Black-hawk - Fountain Creek Regional Park - 5/17/2010

Common Black-hawk - Fountain Creek Regional Park - 5/17/2010

Around this time Warblers and Tanagers were also moving through the area.

Western Tanager - Sondermann Park -5/20/2010

American Redstart - Fountain Creek Regional Park - 5-17-2010

Spring Review Part 1

The first notable bird to show up in the area where I live (El Paso County, Colorado) was a Yellow-crowned Night-heron. It was found in mid April at Fountain Creek Regional Park. Yellow-crowned Night-herons are rare visitors to Colorado and this was the first one I had seen outside of Texas.

Yellow-crowned Night-heron - Fountain Creek Regional Park - 4-18-2010