Mountain Chickadees already moved down to lower elevation

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I found a couple of Mountain Chickadees at Brush Hollow Reservoir yesterday a location that is 25-30 miles from the foothills. I had spotted a single Mountain Chickadee on the Canon City Riverwalk last week but since this is only about 5 miles from the foothills a stray Mountain Chickadee sometimes comes down early but with those at Brush Hollow there may be an early plains invasion of this species. I found the one in these photos feeding on larva that is inside of most of the leaves in the cottonwood trees around my area in the fall. I looked that up two years ago when I first noticed this with warblers feeding like this and found that leafminers are insects that feed inside of leaves and that they produce large 'blotches' that are irregularly round.


There were a lot of Yellow-rumped Warblers in the trees around the reservoir at this location as well as the first Orange-crowned Warblers, a group of 3 moving together, I have seen in migration this fall. Also many Pine Siskins were foraging here. SeEtta

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