A Blue Bird, but not a Bluebird, Out of Place

Mountain bluebird — not what I was
seeing (Cornell University).

After my experience while mushroom-hunting last August, I am half expecting to bump into the Realm of Faerie again.

So when I looked out the front window and saw an abnormally blue little bird (junco-size) pecking around one of the sunflower seed feeders, I could have just said, "Well, it's some weird pet of the Other Crowd, you know. Better leave it alone."

But no. I flipped through some bird guides, trying to figure this out. It looked like someone took a junco and dunked it in blue hair dye.

I knew it was not a mountain bluebird. They are relatively common once you get out of the thick trees and into some open country, and they are a big ol' thrush, relatively speaking, like an American robin.

Indigo bunting (Cornell University).

I even tried Merlin, Cornell's online bird ID guide (which I have on my phone), and which tried to tell me that it was either a mountain bluebird or a white-breasted nuthatch or something else completely wrong.

So I started asking birder friends (and my patient spouse),  and they all came back with "indigo bunting." Obviously the Merlin app was fooled because they are not supposed to be here, but hey, it's May, when migrants are migrating and birds pop up where not expected.

When you look at the indigo bunting's range map, my house is not in its territory, but you know how it is, sometimes wild animals forget to read their owner's manuals. What was it doing up in the montane pine forest? I don't know. It did not stick around.

Do Your Duty as a Hominin!

Mountain lion — or cougar, if you prefer. (Colorado Parks and Wildlife)

I have had some mountain lion encounters, none of them this bad, so permit me some second-guessing. Everyone does it in regard to predator attacks.

Washington state mountain biker Isaac Sederbaum, the initial victim, having then seen his companion attacked by a lion, "later told the authorities that he had to travel about two miles before getting a cellphone signal and calling 911."

Isn't it your duty as a hominin to pick up a heavy stick and go full-on Angry Ape at the cat? They are ambush predators, so they avoid face-to-face showdowns. That might have worked.

But no. Got to make that 911 call. And eventually the lion is tracked with dogs and shot, as so often happens.

Ten thousand ancestors sadly shake their heads.

* * * 

True story: my friends the wildlife rehabilitators had a somewhat parallel experience. She was attacked by a lion inside an enclosure who grabbed her by the head. Her husband was not far away, and as he said, more or less, "I tried to kick a forty-yard field goal with that lion's head as the football."

Then he pulled her to safety, closed the gate, and got her some medical help. Apparently she was a celebrity at the hospital. They don't get to see big-predator injuries very often in Pueblo, Colorado, so all the docs were curious.

Lesser Prairie Chickens Reintroduced in SE Colorado

Some footage from Colorado Parks & Wildlife's ongoing efforts to re-establish lesser prairie chickens on the Comanche National Grassland in southeastern Colorado.

From the CPW news release:

CAMPO, Colo. – Lesser prairie chickens, gone for decades from the Colorado landscape, are again living on the eastern plains, thanks to an ambitious four-year project led by biologists from Colorado Parks and Wildlife, Kansas, the U.S. Forest Service, along with private landowners.

Recently completed surveys by CPW biologists revealed that hundreds of the birds are now thriving on breeding grounds, known as leks, on the plains extending across southeastern Colorado and western Kansas.

Lesser prairie chickens once numbered in the tens of thousands in those grasslands. But a variety of factors led to their gradual disappearance. Experts blame, in part, the conversion a century ago of grasslands to cropland that contributed to the Dust Bowl in 1932 and wiped out many of the birds. More recently, the lesser prairie chicken population in Southeast Colorado and Southwest Kansas was devastated by severe snowstorms, particularly in December 2006, followed by years of drought.

They even vanished on a 330,000-acre swath of sand sagebrush and grasslands known as the Comanche National Grassland in Baca County, Colo., and the Cimarron National Grassland in Morton County, Kan., as well as privately owned rangeland and Conservation Reserve Program grassland. . . .

By 2016, biologists counted just two males on the Comanche and five males on the Cimarron.

That same year, CPW decided to try relocating lesser prairie chickens from thriving breeding grounds in Kansas in hopes of resurrecting leks on the national grasslands. So a CPW team, led by conservation biologists Jonathan Reitz and Liza Rossi, began working in collaboration with the Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism, Kansas State University and the U.S. Forest Service. . . .

Over the past four years, the team of Colorado and Kansas biologists, and K-State graduate students, relocated 103 males and 102 females to the Comanche. The team also released 101 males and 105 females during the same time period just east of the state line 

Read the whole thing. 

Extra-credit question: What is the relationship between prairie chickens and contemporary pow-wow fancy dancing?

After the Fire, There is Art

If I were a landscape painter (like Dad), I would try to do more

with this than just a photo. Golden banner (Thermopsis divaricarpa)

against burned pine trees from 2012.

As you read, Australia had a rough fire season in late 2019-early 2020. To landscape painter Warwick Fuller, that was an opportunity.

The 72-year-old was in the Wolgan Valley in New South Wales, painting the aftermath of the devastating Gospers Mountain fire, which burned through 500,000 hectares of bush over the summer.

It's an area he had often visited in a career spanning 40 years.

Warwick Fuller at work in a fire landscape (Australian Broadcasting Corp.)

Fuller, internationally recognized as an impressionist landscape painter, finds himself drawn to areas recovering from fire.

On his recent painting expedition, green shoots covered the burned trunks of trees throughout the valley, new grass was emerging and the ancient sandstone bluffs, which had inspired him for decades, were a strange mix of colours. 

They reflected renewal amidst the destruction caused by a fire which burned for three months. 

"Light is what really drives me, it's what makes me want to paint the landscape but on top of that I'm trying to interpret what's deeper than just the physical surrounds, the physical objects in the landscape," Fuller said.

He inspires me to do more, although more likely with a camera. I should be more systematic, get out in more weathers, all of it. The year-to-year changes after a fire can be fascinating.

'Winter Burn' on Ponderosa Pines

"Needle drop" is normal with ponderosa pines and other conifers. The pine's needles last two or three years before falling off in a normal way and becoming "duff" on the forest floor. Usually the dead needs fall from the interior of the canopy while new growth occurs at the tips of branches.

On this pine, however, and some growing near it, you can see that the dead, yellow needles are at the tip. A recent news release from the Colorado State Forest Service suggests a reason:

A cold snap in October, coupled with last week’s [mid-April 2020] extreme temperature fluctuations, injured ponderosa pines, other pine species and spruce trees in the Douglas and Elbert county areas, including Castle Rock, Franktown, Parker, Elizabeth and Kiowa.

I  don't live in one of those counties, which include the part of the Black Forest area NE of Colorado Springs, called that for its stands of pine trees. But we had the weather: On April 14, a neighbor's weather station recorded a low of 2° F. (-16° C), following a week of warm temperatures.

Damaged pine and spruce trees may appear grizzled and possess white or straw-colored foliage, referred to as “winter burn.” Other symptoms may include the tips of needles appearing rust-colored while the base of the needles remains green.

The tree I photographed is rooted in a small gully, which means it gets a little more moisture, so it has grown taller than the pines around it. On the other hand, that gully is a conduit for cold air rolling down the slopes.

Unfortunately, little can be done for trees that have sustained winter burn damage, according to Meg Halford, a forester in the Colorado State Forest Service’s Franktown Field Office. However, “the buds on these frost-injured trees may have survived, and they may produce new growth this spring,” Halford said. “Don’t count them out just yet.” 

Some others are showing dead needles that might mean more pine beetle kil/fungus infection. We don't lose whole mountainsides of trees, as has happened with the lodgepole pines further north. It's more a question of a few here and a few there. There is not much I can do about that. The standing dead trees mostly become firewood.

Everything Picturesque about the Upland Southwest

Yellow-blossom cholla cactus, dead Gambel oak, one-seed juniper, barbed wire, old sun-baked tires, pile of rusty tin cans. If it can stab you, it will.

And in the air, the overpowering smell of musk mustard, only slightly sweeter than skunk spray. 

Back home, M. was out picking some wild greens to put in our supper. I suggested musk mustard — all the very best foraging blogs recommend it.

"I don't care what the foraging blogs say," she replied. "It makes me nauseous."

So we get lambsquarter instead. 

Musk mustard, Chorispora tenella, a/k/a purple mustard.

What do the foraging blogs say? Things like this:

There are very few greens tasty enough to make an entire salad out of; musk mustard is one of those greens. Lightly dressed with a drizzle of oil & vinegar and a few crumbles of goat cheese…it’s the perfect salad. If you listened to the National Park Service and cattle ranchers, you’d think musk mustard was a noxious weed. And you’d be missing out on an easy-to-identify, plentiful wild edible.

Or  this:

Among the plants I observed and collected on this trip, wild mustards made a strong showing. These are often overlooked or passed over for sexier wild fare, but wild mustards are plentiful and accessible throughout Denver area right now—making them a good choice for a late April, early May foray. 

No quelites wars at our house, though. I picked some prickly lettuce, which is a little bitter on the line of dandelions, but not more than some of the greens sold in stores.

Colorado to Require Hunting or Fishing License to Access State Wildlife Areas

The past has just turned into the future again. Back in 2006, Colorado began to require "habitat stamps" with hunting and fishing licenses. Here is the rationale:

The program provides a means for Colorado Parks and Wildlife to work with private landowners, local governments, and conservation organizations to protect important fish and wildlife habitat and provide places for people to enjoy our wildlife heritage.

The agency has leveraged a variety of other funds around this core – including Great Outdoors Colorado and federal State Wildlife Grants – to extend the program’s reach. These combined funds have been focused on protecting fish and wildlife habitat and opportunities for hunting and fishing.

It's not a physical stamp; it's simply a surcharge. The then-ten dollar stamp would also permit recreation at areas leased by what was then the Colorado Division of Wildlife, such as Lake DeWeese in Custer County. Then, if I remember right, that requirement was dropped.

Now the Wildlife Commission has tightened the rules:

A valid hunting or fishing license will be required for everyone 18 or older attempting to access any State Wildlife Area or State Trust Land leased by Colorado Parks and Wildlife, beginning July 1.

The rule change was adopted unanimously April 30 by the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission.

“By policy, state wildlife areas are acquired with hunter and angler dollars, and are intended specifically to provide wildlife habitat and wildlife-related recreation,” Southeast Regional Manager Brett Ackerman told the commission at its meeting. “This rule is aimed at curtailing non-wildlife-related use of these properties.

It says "everyone," not just one person in the group or per carload.And it says "license," not habitat stamp. I wonder how this is going to shake out in practice.

From the news release:

At the meeting, Ackerman presented examples from across the state of the increasing use of state wildlife areas inconsistent with their purpose, including set up of temporary residences, vehicular use on big game winter range, vandalism, and other uses detrimental to wildlife and wildlife-related uses.

To continue with my earlier example, Lake DeWeese SWA is leased from an irrigation company. It is already stipulated that non-fishing boat use (such as water-skiing) is not permitted. But now, a fishing license in order to picnic on the shore? Hoo-boy. What a job for the local game warden.

UPDATE, MAY 9, 2020:  "Hiking Bob [Falcone]," columnist for the Colorado Springs Independent, weighs in: "Buying a fishing license to hike in a state wildlife area makes sense."

CPW Volunteer Coordinator Gets Retirement Parade

Up in my county seat, a high-school senior, a 90-something resident, and some small children have somehow earned "social-distancing" birthday greetings that involve sheriff's and fire vehicles driving past they homes with lights and sirens. It's "a thing" now.

M. and I did it yesterday, joining dozens of Colorado Parks & Wildlife volunteers and staffers (some of them have light bars and sirens) in a farewell parade for Jena Sanchez, volunteer coordinator for southeastern Colorado, in lieu of the previously scheduled retirement party.

I cannot recall the exact numbers, but CPW uses a lot of volunteers, which add to an equivalent of something like 150 full-time staff. For this quadrant of the state, Jena was the one who coordinated training, assignments, hours-tracking, general hand-holding, and rewards and recognition. She had the gift of doing all that while making you feel like you were her favorite volunteer.

Some photos from the event, held at the Lake Pueblo State Park visitor center and environs. For video and words from Jena herself, go to Fox 21 (Colorado Springs).

CPW volunteer decorating her car at the Pueblo fish hatchery parking lot.

Some "Bear Aware" vols had a real but old-looking bearskin on their car. (They are
in a program that teaches residents and campers how to avoid bear problems.)

Jena Sanchez (blue shirt) waves to well-wishers as a Colorado Springs TV crew
and a CPW photographer film the event.

And the well-wishers keep coming!

Jena and Larry Sanchez, definitely not at Pueblo Reservoir (CPW photo).