Last Sunday, Denver experienced a record-setting rainstorm. Everywhere it fell it fell, inches after inches. And everywhere it fell is no longer in a drought.
Cold spring rain generally brings migrating birds down to seek refuge among or beneath trees. This year, it brought someone exceptional to my yard: a male Common Poorwill, who I spotted briefly as he flew through my yard, all buffy-colored with his white-tipped tail.
Though not exactly typical poorwill behavior, it’s also not exactly uncommon to encounter a migrating poorwill in urban and suburban Denver. This is especially so amid a cold May rain, which I know as “Poorwill weather.” (Not to be confused with “Goshawk Weather.”) Migrating poorwills are even spotted spending the day on asphalt in Denver. Their stony feathering does a pretty fair job blending into the urban habitat.
All my best friends are insectivores. Why? I’m not really sure, but I think it’s for a few reasons. On one hand, their behavior is often highly visible, as they have to sally out or hawk insects on the wings. This provides wonderful opportunities to watch birds hunting and feeding. On the other hand, I think it’s also because these are birds who have close, but precarious relationships with people. Some, like phoebes and swallows, use human structures for nesting. Kingbirds, meanwhile, are happy enough nesting in unimpressive trees in shopping centers. All, however, depend on us not to so badly damage the earth that we take their prey — flying insects — from them.
Denver’s Local Insectivores
Much of my spring birding focuses on flycatchers. Weekly, I visit Eastern Phoebes along the High Line Canal Trail in Centennial, Colorado. As far as I know, this is their second year of apparent nesting in the area; they’re otherwise scarce in the county. At least one phoebe continues, but I suspect (or hope) the other may be somewhere nearby on a nest. Nearly every yard where I grew up in New York was home to a nesting Eastern Phoebe pair, so the appearance of these birds last year was a happy surprise.
My hope is that subsequent generations of the species might spread out over the Canal and nearby creek as the…
Western Flycatchers did since they started nesting in Centennial. I first noticed them in 2018, but they were probably here earlier than that. During my visits to the phoebes, I’ve been looking for them, too. And on 5/28, I heard the Westerns for the first time this year. They were in at least two locations in Centennial / Greenwood Village (the trail is windy and moves in and out of both towns). Over the past several years, the become more and more common in riparian corridors outside of the foothills, where they’ve generally nested.
Also along the trail were Say’s Phoebes and Western Wood Pewees. I don’t think the pewees nest locally, but I hope they may someday decide to. Not far from the trail, at a local cemetery, were Western Kingbirds. All told, a nice diversity of flycatchers in a thin riparian corridor through the southern suburbs of Denver.
The Obligate Insectivores
On May 30, Cliff Swallows were numerous at the Streets of Southglenn shopping center in Centennial. I first noticed them nesting on the facade of the center last year, bringing to three the swallow species I’ve seen nesting there. Barn Swallows are ultra common, and a few Violet Green nest there, too.
It’s possible that it just took me longer to notice the Cliff Swallows than the other ones. But I kind of doubt it. I’m at the shopping center a lot, and the Cliff Swallows nests stand out. Either way, the number of Cliffs seemed high, as they visited mud puddles created by rain and the always on irrigation systems and built nests above a shuttered Ross’ storefront.
Then, to end May, I had my first nighthawk sighting of the year, a bird flying almost directly north at dusk. The silent bird fluttered a few times, perhaps flycatching. It was preceded by a fairly sizable swallow flock — no clue on species in the low light — and followed by bats.
I anticipate the return of no bird like nighthawks. Their late arrival tips spring toward summer. The long shadows that keep the morning cool give way to the perpetual feeling of high noon. And the nighthawks fit right in, their buzzy calls the sound of summer nights.
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