21 December 2009 Posted by Mike Freiberg | 3:47 PM - 3 comments

North Park CBC!


Happy Holidays everyone! I am very thankful that I was able to participate in three Christmas Bird Counts this year along with some friends. I spent time at the Sterling, Longmont and North Park CBCs. All in Colorado. North Park (halfway between Fort Collins and Steamboat Springs) I sensed would be my favorite just because it was a time of year when I have never visited that area. There were bundles of snow of course. The week before Colorado had a cold spell of some negative temperatures at night, but when one of the park rangers had told me that they had two straight nights of -28F I was shocked. Nevertheless, we set off to find as many birds as we could at 8:30 am. We met up at the Moose Visitor Center which marks the entrance to the Colorado State Forest. The areas around the VC were in our territory, but most had to be reached via foot with a ton of snow on the ground. The group I was with wasn't the show-shoe type so we trolled the roads in search of any birds we could find. It became apparent that we weren't going to find much and it appeared that the cold spell may have scared off a lot of birds.

We noted many Black-billed Magpies and some American Tree-Sparrows but all-in-all it was a dreadful day for our feathered friends. Our group broke off at lunch and I continued to bird the area. I had plans to snow-shoe later, but my first objective was to go chase 60 Gray-crowned Rosy-Finches that another group had spotted at some local feeders. 

The house was in a private ranch and as I drove into the complex the house was difficult to spot being that it was off the beaten path, but lo-and-behold there was the house in question. I jumped out of the car only to nearly slip on the ice in the driveway. You know one of those falls where you do everything in the world except fall and your arms go flailing all over the place. Well, the feeders were on the opposite side of the house from me so I approached quietly pishing some Mountain Chickadees into my face.......






So what would you expect to happen once these guys start buzzing around? You bet, more curious visitors!





Well, we had nuthatches, chickadees, and some Stellar's Jays but no Rosy-Finches. I walked a bit further around the beautiful log cabin and peeked enough of the rest of the yard to see three feeders with Rosy-Finches all over them and a bunch on the ground. My next step however was onto some ice and it snap, crackled, and popped like a Rice Krispie and wouldn't you know it......they all took off. Bummer! It wasn't too long until they started to filter back in and everyone that returned were Gray-crowned Rosy-Finches.





In fact, if I sat long enough I ended up with these little guys darn near on my shoulder. What a relief! A new life bird for me. All three Rosy-Finches are possible on any given day including the Hepburn's race of the Gray-crowned, but what we are seeing in these photos are the interior (most likely) race that breeds in California and the Pacific Northwest. I conferred with fellow prostaffer, Bill Schmoker and he indicated that there could be some hybridizing and sometimes it can be hard to differentiate the races. You can see how some of the gray on the hoods comes down well below the eye. What do you think? Tough call from my chair! The Hepburn's race breeds in Alaska and is marked by a much larger gray patch on the face. The extent of the gray swoops well below the cheek patch or auriculars. Plus the Hepburn's race is a larger and darker subspecies as well.




I certainly got a wonderful fill of this new lifer for me, but decided that my day needed more. I wanted to snow-shoe in hopes of spotting a Boreal Owl in the spruce-fir habitat. I knew I really didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell, but I gave it a shot. The temperature was around 20F, but the snow was up to my knee even with snow-shoes. I shoed it about 1.5 miles in the area of Ranger Lakes and only added Golden-crowned Kinglet to the CBC list. No Boreals!!!! I will have to do some camping and lock down a home range when they are calling at night.





Overall, everything was great. I shot these birds with a Nikon D200 and a 300mm F4 Nikkor lens. Other equipment used was a Nikon 10x42 EDG binocular, 65mm EDG Fieldscope, and and iPod! Good Birding to you all! Happy Holidays.

07 December 2009 Posted by Mike Freiberg | 1:29 PM - 2 comments

White-winged Crossbills!



Recently, a birder in Fort Collins, Colorado found a pair of White-winged Crossbills in the local Grandview Cemetary. Not an ordinary find by any stretch, thus these birds have been attracting people from all over the state. There are lots of listers in this state so you could imagine what a stir this would cause. We know White-winged Crossbills to breed in the high boreal forests of Canada and Alaska with occasional winter irruptions that bring visitors down south. This usually is a function of how good the cone crop is. White-wingers occupy a variety of spruce trees and eat the tiny seeds inside.

In the past my colleagues and I have found breeding White-winged Crossbills in the Black Hills, South Dakota so I already assume they are sporadic breeders, but not this far south. A good friend, Chuck Hagner (editor of Birder's World magazine), had told me that he has witnessed White-winged Crossbills in Duluth, Minnesota breeding in -12 F temperatures. That took me by surprise. I guess this makes them a very opportunistic species. We are all hoping these birds in Fort Collins breed, but only time will tell.

Bill Schmoker and I went to the cemetary early Saturday morning where Bill was able to get the the upper reaches of these mature spruce trees and get these shots. Boy were they high up! There were a good group of about 8-9 people there and I believe everyone had seen the birds. The male was singing his head off, so that is a very good sign. The song is easy to distinguish as it is a long series of bubbly tinkling that can go on for long periods at times.



Male White-winged Crossbills have a very pink appearance when comparing them to the Red Crossbills. Reds will get almost vermilion red sometimes in high breeding, but never with the pink tones of the White-wingers. Both Red and White-winged Crossbills have darker auricular patches, but it is much more pronounced in the Red Crossbill. Also, both have darker wings, but the White-winged variety have a greater contrast not to mention the large white wing bars on each wing near the shoulder patch and tertials in most cases. The female has a white throat, is principally yellow and has streaking all over including the head. These two crossbills are nearly the same size, but Red Crossbills have a much bigger bill in most cases make one think that the Reds are larger. 



These birds were hanging out with about twenty Red Crossbills. I certainly hope these birds breed and will be sure to most again in the future should they hang around for a while. I look forward to getting my Nikon D200 back from the shop so I can go out there get photograph this pair myself.

I would like to thank Bill Schmoker for providing the photos for this post. Good Birding to all of you! thanks for reading!

01 December 2009 Posted by Mike Freiberg | 1:42 PM - 3 comments

Ross's vs. Snow Geese!

Ross's and Snow Geese can sometimes cause problems for those whom aren't used to seeing these two beauties! Both of these geese are high arctic breeders whom population's are growing. They migrate throughout the United States and winter in the southern regions of the country. Usually, I find flocks of Snow Geese with spots of Ross's, so I have come to assume that Ross's Geese are more spread out when migrating and that the Snow Geese population is far greater in numbers overall.



Nikon Birding ProStaffer, Bill Schmoker, was kind enough to loan these vivid photographs of both species and some "Blue" Snow Geese as well. Both of these species come in the all white and blue varieties. This is why it is of utter importance to focus on size and shape to ID these birds. When they are together it is fairly self-explanatory. Notice above the four birds photographed? Can you see the size and shape differences here? There are two of each in this photo! Ross's Goose is a smaller version of the Snow goose sporting a much smaller bill with little or no "Grin," on the bill. That "Grin," is the amount of black on the bill that makes them have a smiling look to them. Snow Geese have a much larger bill with a noticeable dark patch whereas the Ross's may not have any at all or just a tiny bit. If you can see black on the bill from any distance, particularly from afar, then you are looking at a Snow Goose.

Also, notice the Snow Goose with the blue body. This is a different phase that will accompany flocks in far fewer numbers. Ross's Goose also has a blue phase but the size and shape always remains the same!



Here is another example of Snow Geese and the difference with the blue phase. Notice the black smiling patch? With the dark flight feathers (primaries and secondaries) we can also see the extent of the blue on the upper and lower breast region.



I like this photo because we have an adult Snow Goose in the foreground with two Ross's Geese off to the right and back. Look at the size of the birds. Snow with the superior size and longer neck! Let's focus on one of the attributes that I feel is most important. That is the head shape. Ross's Goose has a very round head to accompany the smaller bill. Notice the steeper slope on the forehead as well of the Ross's Goose. I urge you to also focus on the shallow slanted forehead of the Snow Goose. These things can be seen in flight while these birds travel in large flocks of multiple hundreds/thousands sometimes. It always helps to have a nice field-of-view in a binocular to spot these arctic winterers. I use my Nikon EDG 7x42 binocular with superior field-of-view. These bins allow for 417 feet at 1000 yards which is top of the class for this specification. 



This photo (Ross's Goose) above shows us the size differential with the Canada Geese in the background. Snow Geese would be in between these two species seen here.



This final shot of a Ross's Goose shows the perfect round head shape, lack of black smile on bill, shorter neck, and small bill!

Please ask questions should you have them. I would like to thank Bill Schmoker once again for his splendid photos of these birds. He uses a Nikon D2X and a 200-400 VR Nikkor lens for his photography. Good birding!





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