Birding Rocky Mountain National Park 2008
by Cindee DuBey
If you’ve never been to the Rocky Mountains (or even if you have), this place is a MUST. We flew into Denver (elevation 5,280 feet) on Wednesday morning and spent a couple of days there; highly recommended for us “flatlanders”. We used the time to check out the Rocky Mountain Bird Observatory and Barr Lake State Park. It was HOT so birds were not exactly plentiful and we worked hard for some of them. On the second day a wave of Eastern Kingbirds and Orchard Orioles came through and that was fun. We also spent one morning with some “banders in training” and got great (bird-in-the-hand) looks at the birds. Nothing we hadn’t seen before but it was really fun to watch the banding operation anyway. We also got a tip on where to find “endangered” (at least in Colorado) Burrowing Owls. We drove out to check them out as well.
On Friday we headed across Denver and over Berthed Pass and into the Frasier Valley (elevation 8,000 feet give or take a hundred). It was much cooler there (by then Denver was cooler too). On Saturday it rained, hailed, snowed and rained some more so we spent most of our time checking out the “Biker Rally” that we stumbled into. There was also a Veterans Rally happening at the same time so the two seemed to mesh together. Again, it was “interesting”. We did some driving and found wildflowers but we never got back to do any photography there. We also went to a real western rodeo. Interesting again, especially since the mud was 6” or more deep. I felt sorry for the cowboys and cowgirls. They did some pretty impressive bull ridin’ though.
By Monday we were ready for the “top” (elevation 12, 100+ feet) or so we thought. We got to the park early and had an opportunity to photograph a bull moose (lifer for me) and some cow and calf elk. We did make it to the Alpine Visitor’s Center (11,700+ feet) and looked around but hiking was OUT OF THE QUESTION since breathing was difficult enough. Larry did a little walking and did manage to photograph some Pikas at Rock Cut but aside from them, people acting stupid in the snow were about all we saw up there. Time for some lower elevation and OXYGEN.
Tuesday we spent checking out the Frasier River Trail and the Arapaho National Recreation Area. Wednesday morning we hit the park again extra early and were rewarded with shots of Red-tailed Fox, Coyote, Moose (bulls, cows and a calf), Bull Elk (big guys) and a herd of cows and calves. Larry was so close to the herd that he couldn’t take pictures. I have a shot of him surrounded. We again went to “the top” in search of my ptarmigan but to no avail. I did hike about a half mile this time (1/4 out and then back). Larry may have done a full mile but I just couldn’t. We did see Marmots this time and got a little further across the Continental Divide but the sky was beginning to cloud up and we weren’t interested in being above the tree line when a lightening storm moved in so we headed back down our side of the mountain.
On Thursday we made it down the other side and checked out the birding on the “East Front Range”. We learned that there are many more birds over there but no moose or bull elk so I think our side was better, at least more exciting wildlife. We did get to see a few buck mule deer there though.
On Friday it was time for us to head back to the Denver area so we again went “over the mountain”. We tried one last time for the ptarmigan by hiking the Rock Cut Trail. The final elevation was 12,304 feet. I didn’t climb the last rock (straight up) so I figured I made it to 12, 290 feet, high enough for me anyway. The trail is a half mile trail, one-way so I was pretty proud to have made it all the way (finally). Larry scanned the rock edges and all of a sudden called to come and look. It was our bird, a White-tailed Ptarmigan, about 100 yards away. He snapped a couple of shots before it went down over the rocks and although we were pretty sure of what we had seen, we had photos to verify that it was definitely a bird and by checking with rangers, they assured us that a ptarmigan was the only possibility. We headed over to Loveland for the night through a canyon so it was downhill all the way! Just before dark, we stumbled upon some Big-horn Sheep so again stopped to take some shots until the light was totally gone. O.K. so we hit all of the expected mammals on this trip.
Saturday we went back to the park and birded in the Upper Beaver meadow. First thing in the morning there was a herd of elk, all cows and calves but they moved on as the day warmed up. We did a ranger led bird walk and saw Cordilleran, Dusky, and Hammond’s Flycatchers and a beautiful male Williamson’s Sapsucker, all lifers for us, as well as many other birds of that area.
All totaled, we had 102 bird species including 7 lifers (the three flycatchers and sapsucker, Three-toed Woodpecker, White-tailed Ptarmigan, MacGillivray’s Warbler). We had elk, moose, mule deer, red fox, coyote, pika, marmot, least chipmunk, Colorado chipmunk, Wyoming ground squirrel, golden mantel ground squirrel, Frasier squirrel, big horn sheep, bison (at Rocky Mountain Arsenal NWR), muskrat and I’m sure there were more mammals. I have the book and all of the other information that you need so let me know when you are planning a trip out there. I know we are definitely going back!