Purple Martins Routt Co

[Dan Stringer]

Today 7/16 I saw four Purple Martins flying over Hahn's Peak Lake campground in Routt County. Higher up than the swallows foraging over the lake and surrounding aea, these larger birds had stronger wingbeats and a short, more purposeful glide than the erratic swallows. 

Other birds at the lake were an Osprey and Bald Eagle working things out (uncooperatively), Lincoln's Sparrows doing incessant alarm calls, and a few Mountain Bluebirds living up to their name at 8,500'. I went down to the lake for five nights at dusk. Two Great Blue Herons were on patrol, landing at various spots above the shoreline, it seemed they were positioning for small mammals coming to the water. I've seen them hunt prairie dogs near the edge of the plains reservoirs, so to me it made sense for them to hunt voles etc. after a day of fishing.

Dan Stringer

Larkspur, CO