Dinosaur Ridge - Denver Field Ornithologists (10 May 2026) 14 Raptors
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May 10, 2026, 11:41:49 PM (9 hours ago) May 10
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Dinosaur Ridge - Denver Field Ornithologists
Golden, Colorado, USA
Visitors:
Today brought a fantastic number of visitors to the site due to it being Mother’s Day. We had a total of 60 visitors! Many families enjoyed learning about raptor migration and trying to spot one of our local birds. We owe a massive thank you to Cayce and Chris Gulbransen for volunteering today and for so much this season. Your help has been priceless! Thank you Janet Peters for hiking empanadas up to the ridge today, this is our favorite end of year tradition. Thank you to Caroline Fegley for coming down from Laramie to help us count birds! We could list everyone out that has been involved and thank them but it will be much more concise to extend our deepest gratitude to everyone who has been involved in the 2026 count season. We appreciate every volunteer, committee member, donor, and curious visitor. It has been a great year and we are looking forward to the next!
Weather:
It was a beautiful May day with blue skies and minimal cloud cover. Temperatures were warm but not too hot, and there was a nice breeze from the E.
Raptor Observations:
Well, we've done it again. That's a wrap on the 2026 season! Already! We had a nice last day of migration today with birds steadily coming throughout the day, mostly overhead high and W along the west ridge. We had one final Broad-winged Hawk, bringing our total for the year to 99 BW. This year was our highest year ever at this site for observer hours, thanks to our dedicated counters Soren Zappia and Emma Riley. We only had three full weather cancellations this season which aided in this record. Let's talk birds! This season was our 2nd highest Osprey count since 2000, 2nd highest Northern Harrier count since 2005, our 3rd highest Swainson's Hawk count ever, and our 2nd highest American Kestrel count since 1997. We had notably low counts on Turkey Vultures, Golden Eagles, Bald Eagles, and Ferruginous Hawks. We have speculated on the reason for this, and we wonder if a warm winter and less than ideal winds during peak season impacted the movements of these birds. Overall, this season was the second lowest count that we’ve had since Denver Field Ornithologists took over this count site. We value all data collection that happens here, and look forward to analysis that can help us understand these populations and how to best conserve them. Thank you all for another great season!
Non-raptor Observations:
White-throated Swift 2, Broad-tailed Hummingbird 2, Mourning Dove 2, Northern Flicker 1, Say's Phoebe 1, Western Kingbird 1, Blue Jay 1, Woodhouse's Scrub Jay 2, Common Raven 3, Violet-green Swallow 6, Northern Rough-winged Swallow 1, Barn Swallow 1, Cliff Swallow 5, American Bushtit 4, Rock Wren 2, Blue-grey Gnatcatcher 3, American Robin 1, Lesser Goldfinch 1, Pine Siskin 2, Spotted Towhee 3, Western Meadowlark 1, Brown-headed Cowbird 2, Virginia's Warbler 1, Yellow-rumped Warbler (Audubon's) 1, Lazuli Bunting 1, passerine sp. 2
Report submitted by Official Counter of the day shown above (dinor...@gmail.com)
Dinosaur Ridge - Denver Field Ornithologists information may be found at: www.dinosaurridgehawkwatch.org
More information at hawkcount.org: [Site Profile] [Day Summary] [Month Summary]
Count data submitted via Trektellen.org - [Project Details]
Site Description
Dinosaur Ridge is the only regularly staffed hawk watch in Colorado and is the
best place in the world to see migrating Ferruginous Hawks. Hawk watchers may
see 17 species of migrating raptors; and it is an excellent site to see rare
dark morph buteos including Broad-winged hawk, Swainson's hawk, Ferruginous
hawk, Rough-legged hawk and Red-tailed Hawk. Other raptors we see include Golden
and Bald Eagles, Northern harrier, Osprey, Peregrine Falcons, Prairie Falcons,
Cooper's and Sharp-shinned Hawks, American Kestrels, Merlin, and Turkey
Vultures. American Goshawk is uncommon but also counted each season. Non-raptor
species include Rock Wren, Bushtit, Western Bluebird, Sandhill Crane,
White-throated Swift, and American White Pelican. Birders of any skill level are
always welcome. The hawk watch at Dinosaur Ridge is staffed by Hawk Counter(s)
and volunteers from March through early May.
Directions to site:
From exit 259 on I-70 towards Morrison, drive south under freeway and take left
into first parking lot, the Stegosaurus lot. Follow hawk watch signs from the
southwest end of the parking lot to the hawk watch site. The hike starts heading
east on an old two-track and quickly turns south onto a trail on the west side
of the ridge. When the trail nears the top of the ridge, turn left, and walk to
the flat area at the crest of the ridge. (Distance: 0.56 miles, Elevation gain:
259 feet)
Golden, Colorado, USA
| Daily Raptor Counts: May 10, 2026 | |||
| Species | Day's Count | Month Total | Season Total |
| Black Vulture | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Turkey Vulture | 1 | 17 | 179 |
| Osprey | 0 | 4 | 68 |
| Bald Eagle | 0 | 1 | 28 |
| Northern Harrier | 0 | 1 | 51 |
| Sharp-shinned Hawk | 2 | 19 | 214 |
| Cooper's Hawk | 3 | 28 | 277 |
| American Goshawk | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| Red-shouldered Hawk | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Broad-winged Hawk | 1 | 19 | 99 |
| Red-tailed Hawk | 5 | 24 | 486 |
| Rough-legged Hawk | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Swainson's Hawk | 0 | 5 | 57 |
| Ferruginous Hawk | 0 | 0 | 17 |
| Golden Eagle | 0 | 0 | 8 |
| American Kestrel | 2 | 20 | 716 |
| Merlin | 0 | 0 | 7 |
| Peregrine Falcon | 0 | 1 | 11 |
| Prairie Falcon | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| Mississippi Kite | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Unknown Accipitrine | 0 | 0 | 22 |
| Unknown Buteo | 0 | 0 | 5 |
| Unknown Falcon | 0 | 0 | 5 |
| Unknown Eagle | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Unknown Raptor | 0 | 1 | 6 |
| Zone-tailed Hawk | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Total: | 14 | 141 | 2263 |
| Observation start time: | 09:00:00 |
| Observation end time: | 17:00:00 |
| Total observation time: | 8 hours |
| Official Counter | Emma Riley, Soren Zappia |
| Observers: |
Visitors:
Today brought a fantastic number of visitors to the site due to it being Mother’s Day. We had a total of 60 visitors! Many families enjoyed learning about raptor migration and trying to spot one of our local birds. We owe a massive thank you to Cayce and Chris Gulbransen for volunteering today and for so much this season. Your help has been priceless! Thank you Janet Peters for hiking empanadas up to the ridge today, this is our favorite end of year tradition. Thank you to Caroline Fegley for coming down from Laramie to help us count birds! We could list everyone out that has been involved and thank them but it will be much more concise to extend our deepest gratitude to everyone who has been involved in the 2026 count season. We appreciate every volunteer, committee member, donor, and curious visitor. It has been a great year and we are looking forward to the next!
Weather:
It was a beautiful May day with blue skies and minimal cloud cover. Temperatures were warm but not too hot, and there was a nice breeze from the E.
Raptor Observations:
Well, we've done it again. That's a wrap on the 2026 season! Already! We had a nice last day of migration today with birds steadily coming throughout the day, mostly overhead high and W along the west ridge. We had one final Broad-winged Hawk, bringing our total for the year to 99 BW. This year was our highest year ever at this site for observer hours, thanks to our dedicated counters Soren Zappia and Emma Riley. We only had three full weather cancellations this season which aided in this record. Let's talk birds! This season was our 2nd highest Osprey count since 2000, 2nd highest Northern Harrier count since 2005, our 3rd highest Swainson's Hawk count ever, and our 2nd highest American Kestrel count since 1997. We had notably low counts on Turkey Vultures, Golden Eagles, Bald Eagles, and Ferruginous Hawks. We have speculated on the reason for this, and we wonder if a warm winter and less than ideal winds during peak season impacted the movements of these birds. Overall, this season was the second lowest count that we’ve had since Denver Field Ornithologists took over this count site. We value all data collection that happens here, and look forward to analysis that can help us understand these populations and how to best conserve them. Thank you all for another great season!
Non-raptor Observations:
White-throated Swift 2, Broad-tailed Hummingbird 2, Mourning Dove 2, Northern Flicker 1, Say's Phoebe 1, Western Kingbird 1, Blue Jay 1, Woodhouse's Scrub Jay 2, Common Raven 3, Violet-green Swallow 6, Northern Rough-winged Swallow 1, Barn Swallow 1, Cliff Swallow 5, American Bushtit 4, Rock Wren 2, Blue-grey Gnatcatcher 3, American Robin 1, Lesser Goldfinch 1, Pine Siskin 2, Spotted Towhee 3, Western Meadowlark 1, Brown-headed Cowbird 2, Virginia's Warbler 1, Yellow-rumped Warbler (Audubon's) 1, Lazuli Bunting 1, passerine sp. 2
Report submitted by Official Counter of the day shown above (dinor...@gmail.com)
Dinosaur Ridge - Denver Field Ornithologists information may be found at: www.dinosaurridgehawkwatch.org
More information at hawkcount.org: [Site Profile] [Day Summary] [Month Summary]
Count data submitted via Trektellen.org - [Project Details]
Site Description
Dinosaur Ridge is the only regularly staffed hawk watch in Colorado and is the
best place in the world to see migrating Ferruginous Hawks. Hawk watchers may
see 17 species of migrating raptors; and it is an excellent site to see rare
dark morph buteos including Broad-winged hawk, Swainson's hawk, Ferruginous
hawk, Rough-legged hawk and Red-tailed Hawk. Other raptors we see include Golden
and Bald Eagles, Northern harrier, Osprey, Peregrine Falcons, Prairie Falcons,
Cooper's and Sharp-shinned Hawks, American Kestrels, Merlin, and Turkey
Vultures. American Goshawk is uncommon but also counted each season. Non-raptor
species include Rock Wren, Bushtit, Western Bluebird, Sandhill Crane,
White-throated Swift, and American White Pelican. Birders of any skill level are
always welcome. The hawk watch at Dinosaur Ridge is staffed by Hawk Counter(s)
and volunteers from March through early May.
Directions to site:
From exit 259 on I-70 towards Morrison, drive south under freeway and take left
into first parking lot, the Stegosaurus lot. Follow hawk watch signs from the
southwest end of the parking lot to the hawk watch site. The hike starts heading
east on an old two-track and quickly turns south onto a trail on the west side
of the ridge. When the trail nears the top of the ridge, turn left, and walk to
the flat area at the crest of the ridge. (Distance: 0.56 miles, Elevation gain:
259 feet)
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