Common birds in decline-Audubon report

I just realized I failed to post on the National Audubon Society report on "Common birds in decline". It was released last month and the Denver Post had an article on the front page about it. Among the birds found to be declining, the following five species in Colorado were highlighted: Lark Bunting, Horned Lark, Northern Harrier, Western Meadowlark and Evening Grosbeak. All of these are found in SE Colorado.

In addition to the Denver Post article, the Pueblo Chieftain followed up at the beginning of July also with a front page article based on an interview with me including the following: Lark Bunting, Horned Lark, Western Meadowlark, Northern Harrier and Evening Grosbeak.

This pic is of a male Lark Bunting I found in some good grassland habitat in Huerfano Co. In fact, I found this bird in the location I discussed in the Pueblo Chieftain article when I described "driving through some of that good habitat east of Interstate 25 between Pueblo and Walsenburg one day this spring. The lark buntings were thick, with the males in their mating garb of black suits with white wings. . . . About 5 or 6 miles east of there, though, there's a ranchette development - I call them sprawlettes - and there were no more lark buntings."
SeEtta

Far SE Colorado-in the for-real boonies

Today I drove south of Lamar into Baca (pronounced "bach-a" not "back-a", the spanish pronunciation). This is the far SE corner of Colorado and is quite remote but there is a lot of great sand-sage, short-grass prairie and fantastic canyonlands here.

The top photo was taken of the fantastic wildflower show happening on Colorado prairies now, especially in SE Colorado which is finally reaping some benefits from the record-breaking snow storms this winter and good spring precipitation. I took this photo on a section of the Comanche National Grasslands.

The bottom pic is of one of hundreds of Lark Buntings I saw today. Lark Bunting is the state bird of Colorado and are found on eastern Colorado plains. I caught this male in the act of singing as he was on territory and trying to attract a mate.
SeEtta