April 8 - Denver to Wray Colorado

April 8, 2016

April 8, 2016 Denver to Wray Colorado – Day in Rocky Mountain Arsenal Wildlife Refuge

The day started on the cool side but it warmed up quickly and it was a hot afternoon.  We all got a bit of sun.  

We had breakfast at the hotel and we birded around the hotel as there were fields behind the hotel.  We had lovely looks at the Western Meadowlark and took time to get some photos.  Little did we know that we would probably see over a hundred of these birds today.  We headed to the nearby Rocky Mountain Arsenal Wildlife Refuge which according to its name is an old Army Arsenal Base that has been closed as the city of Denver grew to surround it.  It is a huge piece of land and it is on the flight path for the very busy Denver Airport.  We saw a Horned Lark and American Avocets and a Says Phoebe before we even got to the Visitor Center.  This place has a 9 mile wildlife drive where we spent the morning and afternoon exploring.  The first part of the drive is the Bison prairie area where one drives over cattle grates at the beginning and the end.  There are signs that say do not get out of the vehicle as the Bison are very dangerous and aggressive.  We saw the Bison , which are huge  and there were younger ones and full grown ones.  This herd has been in the park for thirty years according to the very nice volunteer at the visitor center.  

We traveled on to the lakes area of this park where we visited the different lakes, Mary and Ladora.  Ladora had plenty of ducks, American Wigeon, Blue-winged Teal, Greater Scaup, Eared Grebe, Western Grebe, to name a few.  We had a lovely picnic lunch by Ladora on a bench.  Connie and Jane had a bought salad supplemented with boiled eggs from breakfast and I had a self made avocado and tomato and boiled egg salad.  It was just gorgeous here and some the views here included the snow clad mountains in the far distance. 

We met a birder – a fellow from New York state who was here for the Chicken Run also.    He had seen a Canvasback Duck and so we stopped to see it and chatted with him.  He ended up taking our threesome photo today.  The mountains were behind us but don’t show up on the photo. 

It was hot by then and we traveled to the end of the road to look for raptors and Burrowing Owl as we were advised to at the Visitor Center.  No luck on the Burrowing Owl but we had a Bald Eagle sitting on its nest in the distance.

Just before leaving the park around 4 pm we stopped to take a look at the Great Horned Owl on its nest with one new owlet  who was still white and fluffy.  We only saw their heads but it was sweet.

From here we headed down the Quebec Parkway to Highway 76 East to Wray.  We saw several raptors one of which we did not know exactly what it could be and with Connie’s photo, we will get Jeff to take a look at it once Jeff, his dad and his son all arrive tomorrow.  We did see a Swainson’s Hawk and then we had a mystery raptor that disappeared while we were turning around to see it.  The area was very flat prairie/farm lands and large dormant fields that extend out to the horizon.  There are few trees but many Tussock type grasses.  There were many European Starlings, Common Grackles and Western Meadowlarks here.    We went through many sad, derelict towns Fort Morgan, Yuma etc, where there were abandoned buildings in the small towns.  Our destination was Wray where we are spending the next two nights and this town seems to be a little more prosperous.

One disturbing view that we had several times which we could smell the ammonia before we saw them were several large ugly cattle feedlots.  These are real big feed lots with thousands of cattle in inhumane holding conditions; in muddy holding pens where the smell of ammonia reeks for miles.  Nothing grows on the ground in these conditions.  This is enough to make one swear off beef for ever!  These feed lots should not be allowed.  In a couple of cases, the feedlots were jammed with cattle and across the highway were free range cattle, just grazing away. 

Once we checked into the hotel, Cobblestone Inn and Suites just outside Wray, we went into town for supper.  It was dark already and we were told by the front desk the best restaurant was the Fourth and Main Restaurant.  What we did not know was that it was upstairs and the place had no sign  or evident front door, which  we found locked.  It took us three tries to find the place and finally Jane saw a human on his porch BBQing and called to him from our behemoth car for directions.  We found it where we thought it could be, but we discounted it as there was no evident front door and we didn’t know it was upstairs!!  It was worth the effort as the food was pretty good.  Plus it was the only restaurant in town besides the Tavern.

It was a good day with over forty species of birds.
Here are some of the birds for the day: Eurasian Collared Dove, American Coot and Swainson's Hawk