Birds and Nature

I enjoyed watching a migrating flock of  about 50 White-throated Swifts engaged in frenzied breeding along the Arkansas River near the Florence River Park. I have observed similar feeding flocks at this location in previous years as they make their way to locations further west with cliffs. Fyi-these pics are good enough quality to be enlarged for better viewing, just click on each pic. I wonder if some of these are on their way to the Royal Gorge just west of Canon City and only 20-25 years west of this location.  SeEtta

A few days ago I spotted another migrating flock of White-throated Swifts, but this flock was east of Canon City in the Brewster area. Though they appeared to be following the Arkansas River as I have observed in previous years, they had stopped to feed and were foraging up to about a quarter mile from the river. Finally I got a photo of one that shows the eye on one of the swifts. I have spotted migrating flocks of White-throated Swifts in previous years including these also along the Arkansas River but just east of Florence. SeEtta

Over the week-end I did some birding at the Royal Gorge Park (not the for-pay now amusement park but the free and not-yet developed park owned by the City of Canon City). One can get to the edge of the Royal Gorge Canyon which is breathtaking and not uncommonly flown by White-throated Swifts. There was a fairly good sized flock of White-throated Swifts that were in a feeding frenzy--one came so close past me, only a few feet, that I reflexively pulled my outstretched camera back close to my body. As can be seen by the pic just above this is a very scenic backdrop for watching these aerobatic swifts. The pic just above shows about 20 of the flock that totaled more than 50 birds, evidently a migrating flock that had stopped over to feed. SeEtta

Please don't complain about the photo--this flock of White-throated Swifts that contained this one bird was circling over a hundred feet over the Arkansas River (likely place for insects to capture) and they do not fly slow. I was amazed to find well over a hundred of these birds that stopped briefly to feed as they are migrating through. I tried to look at every swift I could to see if there were other swift species but only saw White-throated. SeEtta

I thought this photo really showed off some of it's field marks of this species: white throat and belly and white sides on rump. The tips of the secondaries show up as lighter in color though not white. SeEtta

Before I left Florence River Park yesterday a flock of 30 or so White-throated Swifts that were migrating made a stop-over to feed above this location (it is not near any cliffs but I have seen this species overhead during migration here before). These birds were flying at 100+ feet high as they flew in around and around overhead. These swifts always challenge my ability to not only track them quickly as they fly over but hold my heavy camera and long lens steady--plus with my lens and extender combination I have to manually focus. So I was happy how well these pics came out. SeEtta