Black Swifts

Last nite we stayed in Boulder with friends, and went to eat dinner at The Kitchen. It was quite noisy, so the conversation was a bit difficult, but the food was very good. We tried a variety of dishes including a California produced buratta (a mozzarella like cheese generally found throughout Italy), beet salad, sauteed squid, mussels in wine, tagliatelle with morel mushrooms and peas, and smoked duck breast. We drank a very nice verdejo from Spain, and a true to type '07 nebbiolo from Cantina del Pino. Dessert was a toffee sticky pudding, 2000 LBV port from Sandeman, and moscato from La Spinetta. Back at our friends we opened a '97 brunello di Montalcino that they had brought back from Italy. It proved to be an excellent nightcap.

I dropped my wife at the Denver airport mid-day, and picked up my friend from Austin. We drove up to Rocky Mountain NP to bird the Wild Basin area of the park in hopes of seeing some black swifts fly over late in the afternoon on their way back to their nesting area. It was generally pretty quiet bird-wise except for seeing a few red-naped sapsuckers (photo above--click on it to enlarge). We walked back and forth between 2 open areas, constantly scanning the sky for the swifts. After watching many tree swallows for 3 hours, about 7:15 three black swifts flew right over our heads on their way home.

Week #25 is now completed. Only 2 more birds were added for the week, but the swift was a new year bird, bringing the YTD up to 625. Tomorrow my friend and I will be up at 5 AM to drive up to the really high country to look for white-tailed ptarmigans. Stay tuned!