Bird watching can really slow down in August –at least at Palmer Lake anyway. So I'm kind of surprised to have 6 photos that I want to share from my visit this Saturday morning. The first is a Downy Woodpecker that I was able to get very close to. This male Downy (as evident by the red patch of feathers on his head) was busy looking for insects inside dried up cattail and other weed stalks. Compared to pounding into a tree I'm sure this was much easier!
I saw him poke a hole into it and even saw his long tongue come out once. Maybe it's because I was close but I thought for sure that this was a Hairy Woodpecker which is about 3 inches larger than a Downy. But with my photo I was able to catch a small detail that helps a person distinguish between the two nearly identical species. Notice the small black dots near the tips of the white tail feathers –something a Hairy Woodpecker does not have! In the same general area were lots of Goldfinches coming and going and making plenty of noise too. I've been trying for weeks to get a nice photo of one and am coming to realize it's just not that easy. Here and there I could see one or two through the tall green grass and this was one that did not seem shy of me. To me it's brownish coloration reminded me of how the males will look in winter. But why did it look this way now in the middle of August?
It puzzled me enough to ask other birders and it turns out I overlooked the most obvious answer. It is a juvenile! Whilst standing here watching, I finally spotted a bright yellow male but there was not a clear view of him through the tall grass. Eventually he worked his way upwards and grabbed a hold of a blade of grass to bend it over.
At the time I didn't notice but in the photo now I can see there are little green aphids on the grass. I don't know for sure if that's what he was after or not. I didn't watch closely enough to see if that was the case. There was one more little yellow bird that I saw today further along the wood chip trail to the south. This was a female Common Yellowthroat who teased me with only a partial view from behind some cattails. I often forget that this species is a Warbler, seeing as how they are here in our area for almost the entire summer season and how easily they can be found through their constant and loud songs. Though I've heard plenty of them lately, I've seen only females in the past few weeks.
Later on the north side I spotted a bird that I've not seen in some time now –possibly since spring. I first noticed a patch of bright red against white which usually means one thing, a male Rose-breasted Grosbeak. They are one of my favorite birds but every year I notice that the males in particular become very scarce in the summer. After trying for a while to coax it out of the thick buckthorn, I noticed movement which I followed to another tree. Finally it was out in the open where I could get a photo. But as I did I quickly realized it was not the same bird. This was in fact a juvenile and more obviously a juvenile male! This is something I've never seen before and was quite exciting. It still had many of the characteristics of an adult female –the striped brownish head and even the rusty orange breast with small speckles. But in the middle of that breast was the bright red patch of an adult male.
This photo was lightened up considerable to show some of those details. Its great to know that this bird is possibly nesting in or near the Palmer Lake area! Finally, on the northeast side of the park I had spotted what looked like a Song Sparrow fly down from a perch and start following another bird very closely. When a bird shows this behavior of following another around and opening it's mouth for food it can only mean one thing –that it is a young bird or "fledgeling." Indeed this odd looking Song Sparrow with some yellowish coloring on it's face was being fed by the adult which was a neat sight. I took quite a few photos but hardly got any focused shots of the action of feeding that happened so quickly.
After getting it's meal though, the young bird would still be very close to the adult giving me multiple good photo opportunities of the pair.
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