Historical Front Range abundance of Black-chinned Hummingbird and Blue Jay

[Margaret Smith]

I spent a great deal of time south of (and above) Nederland at the University of Colorado Radio Astronomy Observatory during the spring, summer, and fall of 1973, monitoring solar activity for the protection of the Sky Lab astronauts. Black-chinned Hummingbirds were abundant at the RAO feeder (about half as common as Broad-tails), and obviously nesting in the proximity. Now, they are the most common daily visitors to my Boulder feeder, spring through fall, and obviously not migrants.

However, Bailey and Niedrach (1965) lists them as “resident in southwest and stragglers to the northward and east.” Andrews and Righter (1992) lists them as “casual in northeastern foothills (five records).”

I grew up in Denver (50s & 60s) and have lived in Boulder since 1970. I didn’t become a birdwatcher till the early 70s, but previously kept track of what I saw. I saw my first Blue Jay in north Boulder in 1978. Now, they are the most common species at my backyard feeder.

Bailey and Niedrach (1965) lists the first Denver Area record as 1937 and documents finding several subsequently. The Spring Count of 1962 shows “Boulder 1”. The map in Andrews and Righter (1992) shows gray (uncommon to fairly common) for them except in the eastern Platte Valley, and lists the first breeding record in Pueblo County in 1970.

Can the community please comment on time of arrival of abundance for these two species?

-- Margaret Smith

[Paula Hansley]

Margaret and all,

The eastern Blue Jay arrived in the Denver-Boulder area in the early 1960s when I was at CU.  During the first few years, the Blue Jay hybridized with the Steller’s Jay!  The hybrids had Steller’s Jay heads and Blue Jay tails. The hybrid birds had strange calls  as you might expect. There were some backcrosses, but I don’t remember what the birds looked like.

I don’t recall anything about the Black-chinned Hummingbird.

Note:  I saw my first Eurasian Collared-Dove in Colorado in 1995.

Paula Hansley

Louisville

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[Michele Bloom]

Margaret, I live at WindCrest, SW of Denver (Highlands Ranch), near Chatfield Reservoir. We've had Black-chinned Hummingbirds in recent years at our feeders but not in abundance.I saw them at my feeder early in the summer. I also had occasional Black-chins at my home feeders in Centennial before moving here. At WindCrest we have many native plants in our gardens ,and they predictabley come to the Arizona Hummingbird (Zaucheneria) plants in our pollinator garden, This summer I had a remarkable experience of finding a Black-chinned nest at eye level -- 4-feet away on a pathway into my building. The mother appeared and I watched her sitting on the nest with two little fluff balls of grey. The nest was beautifully constructed of dry grasses and had a woven rim; it looked like intricately woven spider webs for reinforcement. I checked on the nest twice every day for a couple of weeks. Eventually one baby fledged, leaving a smaller one behind. The mother was not seen for a week or so, but the baby continued to grow. After a windstorm, I saw him on the rocks below his torn nest. He was then seen back in the partial nest for a few days. And the next time, I saw him on a branch below, clinging to a small limb. I think the mother must have been watching him and feeding him all along. Shortly after, I saw him in the center of the shrub and she was there feeding him. Both were gone the next time I passed by. A few days later I passed some flowering plants quite a distance from the nest and saw a mother and juvenile feeding there. I like to think it was the two of them, preparing to migrate. It ws a happy experience. A few weeks ago, our maintenance staff told me that multiple hummingbirds were being seen near a garage opening. I checked there and saw three Black-chinned Hummingbirds in small trees out side the garage. Later they reported that the birds were nesting in the garage. In August!

Michele Bloom