Colorado Nature Narratives

On August 8, 2011, Lenore Fleck and I went for a short hike on the Lower Columbine Trail in North Cheyenne Cañon Park. The first mile of the Columbine Trail follows Cheyenne Creek and provided cool hiking for us in the shade of ponderosa pines, white firs and willow trees. Within the first few minutes of our hike, we were amazed to see a gorgeous orange bird with black wings fluttering in a tree near us. Neither one of us had ever seen a bird like this before! Fortunately, we got a good look at this brand new bird (to us) as it fed a fledgling at close range. After consulting two bird books, we identified it as a male Scarlet Tanager, Orange Variant.

Scarlet Tanager, Orange Variant. Photo by Bill Maynard

I called expert Colorado Springs birder Bill Maynard who immediately dropped what he was doing and drove to the Park. Fortunately, Bill arrived in time to observe the male Scarlet Tanager, Orange Variant, still tending the juvenile bird. Bill took some great photographs to document the unusual bird and reported it to Colorado’s Rare Bird Alert.

Photo by Bill Maynard

Typically, Scarlet Tanagers nest in the eastern United States and are considered rare sightings if they are seen west of central Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. To see this rare Tanager with its even more rare “Orange Variant” color was quite a birding event. Local birders and I exchanged emails during the next 24 hours, and several of us had the good fortune of seeing the colorful Tanager the following morning. I looked for it again today, August 13, but couldn’t find it.

My thanks to Bill Maynard for his permission to post his great photographs of the Scarlet Tanager, Orange Variant, and to reprint his descriptive email:

“I looked at my photographs and the Scarlet Tanager grabbed what looks like a yellow jacket or other yellow and black abdomened wasp, worked the stinger end between its mandibles, probably disabling the stinger, and fed it to the juvenile.  Pretty cool.”     – Bill Maynard

Tanager preparing wasp to feed to fledgling bird. Photo by Bill Maynard

Scarlet Tanager, Orange Variant, feeding fledgling. Photo by Bill Maynard.

Few people can hike through our mountain forests without being scolded by a pine squirrel. Also called a chickaree, this little gray squirrel is very noisy and territorial.

The chickaree gnaws through the cones of ponderosa, spruce and fir trees to reach its preferred food—conifer seeds. Similar to the way you and I eat corn-on-the-cob, the squirrel holds the pinecone between its front paws. Then, it turns the cone as it chews off the woody bracts all the way down to the pinecone’s core. Between the bracts, it finds the nutritious seeds.

Chickaree eating a cone. (Photo by Bret Tennis)

Usually the squirrel has a favorite feeding tree where it eats and then drops leftover pinecone pieces. The shredded cones at the base of its feeding tree may accumulate into huge piles, called middens, that are sometimes several feet across and over two feet deep. Very large middens are evidence that several generations of chickarees have used the same feeding tree for decades.

Pine Squirrel Midden (Photo by Bret Tennis)

In summer and fall, the chickaree gathers pinecones and buries them in the midden to serve as its winter and early spring food supply. On cold winter days, the well-prepared squirrel retrieves and eats a few of its stored cones.

As you walk or picnic in the higher elevations of our Colorado Springs mountain parks and open spaces —Garden of the Gods, Red Rock Canyon, Section 16 or North Cheyenne Cañon—look for a chickaree’s midden at the base of an evergreen tree. And if you hear a chattering squirrel long before you can see it, no doubt it is a chickaree.

On June 7^th, I took a short trip to Rocky Mountain National Park to see some of my favorite mountains sparkling white, wearing this year’s unusually high snowpack. Trail Ridge Road finally opened on June 6^th, its latest opening in 20 years, with 30-foot snow drifts covering parts of the alpine highway.

Long’s Peak at 14,259 feet towered over the Estes Park Valley and the blue jewel of Lily Lake. Every summer, I take a wildflower hike on the lake’s circular trail. This early in June, I was treated to a return to Spring. Light lavender Pasque flowers that bloomed in April in Colorado Springs were in full bloom on the west side of the lake. Scattered beneath the Ponderosa Pine trees was the largest natural garden of Pasque flowers I’d ever seen.

Long's Peak, June 7, 2011

The higher elevation of Estes Park, cooler temperatures and ample precipitation provided the perfect environment for these wildflowers to bloom a few weeks later than in the foothills. That’s one of the extra benefits of living in Colorado. You can follow Spring up the mountainsides.

Pasque Flowers at Lily Lake

Pasque Flower Close-up

Lily Lake and the Mummy Range

Photo Credits: all three photos by Nature Narratives author Melissa Walker

When I first moved to Colorado Springs, I was an 18-year-old college student. More than anything else about that first year, I remember the thrill of waking up every morning and looking out at Pikes Peak. My parents saved the letters I wrote that fall, letters full of long descriptions about the clear, crisp weather, the sky that always seemed to be blue, and the new snowfall on the tops of the mountains.

Having grown up comfortably enveloped in the hardwood and pine forests of Louisiana, I simply felt different in Colorado. I felt as tall as any tree as I gazed out at the expansive horizon. Views of horizons were new to me.

Here in this place, I could see where I wanted to go. I wanted to go around Cheyenne Mountain to see what was on the other side. I wanted to explore the upended rocks of Garden of the Gods. I wanted to climb Pikes Peak.

Then, I found that wherever I went in the Pikes Peak Region, I could see where I had been. On top of Mt. Cutler, I could see my dorm back on campus. On top of Pikes Peak, I could see the cottonwood trees marking Fountain Creek’s path to the Arkansas River—a river that eventually met the Mississippi and flowed through my home state. Like so many before me, I was captivated by this place. Now it is my home.

In the ensuing years, I have discovered that alongside this Region’s stunning beauty are unforgettable stories of its people; inseparable from its beauty are its native plants and wildlife; and the foundations of its beauty are its rocks, canyons, mountains and horizons.

Pikes Peak on the Horizon & Indian Paintbrush

Photo by Author Melissa Walker

Dry, dry, dry and windy sums up the weather in Colorado Springs for the last two months. During March and April, we usually have over a foot of snow. This year, we have had only a dusting. I went on a short hike last week at Bear Creek Nature Center to look for my favorite spring wildflower – the Pasque flower. The trails showed few signs of spring – it has been so dry. Finally, I found two pale Pasque flowers beginning to bloom on a shady slope. They had pushed through a brittle layer of last year’s scrub oak leaves.

Pasque Flowers and Oak Leaves

Later that day, my brother called from Steamboat Springs, Colorado, to describe how migrating birds are beginning to arrive in his snow-filled part of the state. He sent a photo of a Sandhill Crane struggling to walk on snow and of a Mountain Bluebird perched on snow. The birds are having a difficult time finding any bare ground. He described Steamboat Springs’ weather for the last two months as “snow, snow, snow and more snow.” This week, the Steamboat Springs Pilot newspaper reports that the area still has 15 feet of snow on nearby Buffalo Pass and over 9 feet on Rabbit Ears Pass. My brother reports that he has over two feet of snow in his yard in town.

Sandhill Crane Walking through Snow

Mountain Bluebird Perched in Snow

How could our weather be so different? Colorado Springs is in a rain shadow, a phenomenon of mountain weather patterns. Colorado Springs is on the east slope of Colorado’s mountains, and Steamboat Springs is nestled against the northwest side of the mountains. When the moisture-laden Pacific storms reach Colorado’s northwestern mountains, the winds push the storms up the crest of the mountains, where the moisture condenses in the cold air and falls as snow.

By the time the storms blow to the east side of the mountains 100 miles away, the clouds have often released all their moisture, leaving Colorado’s Front Range cities and eastern prairies “high and dry.” Also, this spring’s weather is a continuation of the La Niña pattern where most of the snowstorms are tracking across Colorado’s northern mountains (according to the Natural Resources Conservation Service).

Fortunately, as of this week, rain showers are finally bringing some moisture to Colorado Springs. And eventually, warmer days will bring an end to Steamboat Springs’ snow – at least for this year.

Photo Credits:

Thanks to my brother Winston Walker for his photos of the Sandhill Crane and Mountain Bluebird

Pasque Flowers by author Melissa Walker

Recently I read The River in Winter, a collection of essays by Stanley Crawford. The author describes the rhythms of life and seasonal changes on his northern New Mexico farm and in the natural land bordering his cultivated fields. He observes how people absorb knowledge of their natural world without even trying. Even if they don’t know the names of trees, birds or flowers, they will know which trees leaf out first, where a hawk likes to perch, where the first flower of spring will bloom.

Light green bark of aspen trees

I have found this to be true. Even as a little girl growing up in north Louisiana, I knew when to look for ripe blackberries, that one bird sang only at night, and I recognized the songs of many birds even though the birds remained nameless to me for a long time. Over the years, though, I began to pay more attention to the natural world and came to expect to be surprised by nature on almost every venture outside. Just yesterday in my Colorado Springs neighborhood, I saw a Merlin, a small falcon with dark plumage, for the first time in my life. It was perched in one of the tall cottonwood trees right across the street. And in our backyard, I noticed the faint green color of chlorophyll that shades the bark of aspen trees, and heard the two-note whistle of the Black-capped Chickadee, reminding me that the first day of spring is only 23 days away.

Image via Wikipedia

Photo Credit: Bark of Aspen Trees by Melissa Walker; Black-capped Chickadee from Wikipedia

A scrabbling sound was the first indication of unusual activity in our backyard. I rushed to the window just in time to see the blurred motion of a red fox jumping up our fence, then turning 180 degrees to jump down and run in the opposite direction. Almost within reach of the fox’s tail were two bobcats! They pursued the fox for about 50 feet, and then abruptly stopped when the fox jumped out of our yard. Then the bobcats leisurely stretched out on the grass, yawned and were joined by a third bobcat. The fox was lucky that the bobcats gave up the chase, at least for today.

Bobcats lounging

The bobcats relaxed in the sunny part of our yard for about two hours, then roused themselves to drink from our backyard pond and to play in our pond’s filter tank. They looked liked overgrown housecats as they tussled in the tank. Then, one of the bobcats began scratching on an aspen tree, stretching upward 34 inches (I measured the next day), and dragging its claws down the soft bark. According to Timothy Mallow in his article Bobcat Ecology, “the vertical scratches made by the bobcat’s claws leave a visual marker and also leave a scent on the tree that originates from sweat glands in bobcat’s paws. Bobcats maintain and defend their ranges with the use of territorial markers, such as tree scratches. The home range of a female bobcat averages 2900 acres.” That is more than twice as large as Garden of the Gods Park (1367 acres).

Bobcat drinking from backyard pond

Bobcat scratching aspen tree

Bobcats playing in filter tank

The backyard bobcat drama lasted all day. By mid-afternoon, I noticed a fox squirrel at the tiptop of an aspen tree, anxiously flicking its tail and chattering. Half way up the same tree was one of the bobcats! When the squirrel jumped into the top of an adjacent aspen, the bobcat slowly backed down the tree trunk, then turned and jumped to the ground. I thought the hunt was over. But no, the bobcat looked up, located the squirrel and proceeded to climb the second tree. Then I observed that a second bobcat was patrolling the top of our back fence, near the squirrel’s tree.

At this point, I guessed that the squirrel would outlast the bobcats in patience and would remain at the very top of the tree until the bobcats left the neighborhood. I decided to check back in 5 minutes, but by then, I had missed the action. There was the bobcat strolling through the backyard with the lifeless squirrel in its mouth.

As the successful predator settled down to eat its prey, the other two bobcats watched neighborhood birds from the vantage point of our deck and took another nap. The three bobcats finally left our backyard in the late afternoon.

Bobcat sitting on our deck

The bobcats are probably three of the four kittens that were born in our neighbor’s yard last spring. Although the mother bobcat and her four kittens left their den in early July, neighbors occasionally saw one or more of the bobcats during the fall. Just last week, in mid-January, one neighbor saw all five bobcats – presumably the mother and the almost-grown kittens – parade across her deck in single file following the lead bobcat that held a dead squirrel in its mouth. The bobcats will soon deplete the easy prey in our neighborhood and move on to another part of their home range. Sometime between now and May, when the kittens are almost a year old, the mother will “evict her kittens from her home range.” Until then, we fortunate neighbors may glimpse the “wild kingdom” in our own Westside Colorado Springs neighborhoods.

2 young bobcats nuzzle, creating a mirror image

Bobcat jumping off our deck

Photo Credits: All photos were taken by author Melissa Walker.

Ten months ago in one of my first blogs, I used a quote from my favorite nature writer Ann Zwinger. The year 2010 marked the 40th anniversary of her classic natural history book, Beyond the Aspen Grove, still my favorite. I chose my nature blog’s tagline “always something new to discover” from Ann’s words:

Beginning to know these mountain acres has been to discover a puzzle with a million pieces already set out on a table. Occasionally a few pieces fit together and we gain another awareness of the land’s total pattern of existence, of its intricate interdependencies, enhanced by knowing that the puzzle will never be completed. There will always be something new to discover… (From Chapter 1, Beyond the Aspen Grove)

As I write today, a snowstorm has settled over Colorado Springs and every shape outside my window is now etched in white. With 2010 drawing to a close, I am reflecting on the turning seasons of this year and thought I’d share a few of my favorite Colorado discoveries with you, with homage to Ann Zwinger.

Sandhill Cranes and Sunset, Sangre de Cristo Mountains, late winter

Northern Flicker, late winter

Bobcat with two of her four kittens, late spring

Alpine Tundra Wildflowers: Alpine Forget-Me-Nots and Dwarf Clover on the west slope of Pikes Peak, mid-summer

Golden aspen leaves paint the mountainsides in autumn

Snow-covered Backyard with pond, aspen trees and tall stalks of teasel, early winter

Happy New Year!

Photo Credits: Cranes, Bobcats, Wildflowers, Aspen and Pond by Melissa Walker; Flicker by Les Goss

To see the moon begin to “disappear” at the exact time forecast is exhilarating. It is 11:33 p.m. (MST), December 20, 2010.  Now, it’s 12:06 a.m. and the Earth has cast its shadow over almost half the moon. The shaded lunar surface faintly glows dark, dark red.

In the southern sky, just below the eclipsed moon, is the constellation of Orion. Looking through my binoculars, I observe that Orion’s bright star Betelgeuse, a red giant, is very similar in color to the eclipsed moon.

Partial Lunar Eclipse

It is now 12:51 a.m. and the moon has been totally in Earth’s shadow for 10 minutes. Without its bright white reflected light, the moon looks like the 3-dimensional sphere it actually is, instead of a 2-dimensional circle. It also looks smaller, yet heavier. It looks as if its weight will cause it to fall from the sky, something I’ve never imagined before. The sky has darkened and many stars appear that were invisible in the bright light of the full moon. I see the Seven Sisters and the Twins.

It is a perfect night to view the eclipse from Colorado Springs. Lucky us.

Total Lunar Eclipse by Les Goss

Photo Credit: Thanks to Les Goss, my husband, for both eclipse photos.

Late in the afternoon on September 10, volunteers and friends met in Garden of the Gods Park in Colorado Springs to observe the White-throated Swifts and their sunset flight behavior. The fast-flying birds are one of the reasons that the Garden of the Gods is a National Natural Landmark, as the Park is one of the largest summer and migratory roosting sites for the White-throated Swifts along the Rocky Mountain Front Range.

When our group gathered on the west side of North Gateway Rock, the Swifts were flying so high overhead that they were difficult to see without binoculars. Then, as the sun sank lower toward the horizon, the Swifts lowered their circular flight pattern over the Park’s Central Garden area. We could hear the birds twittering as they flew in wide circles near their roosting sites. Then, as the sun dipped behind Pikes Peak, the Swifts began to funnel into a long crack on the west side of the Tower of Babel in North Gateway Rock, their primary roosting site. It took about ten minutes for the Swifts to disappear into the large rock crevice and smaller roosting sites nearby.

Swifts flying at sunset, Garden of the Gods

In 2009, I observed that the Swifts migrated on September 23, just before a cold front brought snow to the foothills. This year, Lenore Fleck watched for the Swifts’ departure. On September 25, 2010, she wrote, “No change in weather, still warm and dry. Yesterday, the Swifts were circling at six-o’clock. Today, silent skies.”

The Swifts migrated to the southwest border of the United States and farther south into Mexico where they will find abundant flying insects to sustain them through the winter. At the Garden of the Gods, we will be watching for the Swifts to return in early April as they complete another full circle of their annual migration journey.

Swift Rescued

This fall, Haleigh Shafer, Garden of the Gods Park Intern, rescued a White-throated Swift that she found lying in the Visitor Center parking lot. Before the bird was transported to a wildlife rehabilitation center, Haleigh took several photos. In this photo, note how the bird’s folded wings are longer than its tail. The Swift’s wingspan is 15 inches and its body is only 6.5 inches. The photo shows how small a Swift really is, about the size of a cell phone, yet it migrates hundreds of miles every fall and spring.

Swift rests next to cell phone

Photo Credits:
Swifts flying next to North Gateway Rock by Dave Meyers.
Swift resting next to cell phone by Haleigh Shafer.