Twenty-one observers conducted the Cheyenne Bottoms CBC on Saturday December 14th. A cold, cloudy, windy morning made early birding a little challenging, but the sun coming out by mid-morning warmed the area and made birds quite active. Most of Cheyenne Bottoms was frozen solid, so waterfowl, besides geese were hard to find; however, sandpits and city ponds were common hangouts. The Cheyenne Bottoms Christmas Bird Count encompasses a 15-mile diameter count circle that includes Cheyenne Bottoms as well as other parts of Barton County. Participants were divided into small groups and assigned a certain section of the count circle to identify and count as many birds as could be found.
They tallied 80 species and a total of 263,076 individuals with the following notes of interest: over 28,000 geese, 12 duck species, 27 bald eagles, 107 northern harriers, 84 red-tailed hawks, five ferruginous hawks, 15 rough-legged hawks, five white-winged doves, 11 short-eared owls, 23 red-bellied woodpeckers, 21 white-breasted nuthatches, one winter wren, three townsends solitaires, and over 200,000 red-winged blackbirds. A complete list follows:
A free lunch was provided by The Nature Conservancy and Kansas Wetlands Education Center for all the participants of the Christmas Bird Count.
Dec 14, 2012 Cheyenne Bottoms Christmas Bird Count results:
80 species
Greater white-fronted goose 1,697
Snow goose 10,938
Ross’s goose 200
Cackling goose 8,323
Canada goose 7,084
Wood duck 23
Gadwall 15
American wigeon 5
Mallard 3,349
Northern pintail 27
Green-winged teal 23
Redhead 27
Ring-necked duck 32
Lesser scaup 6
Common goldeneye 35
Common merganser 18
Ruddy duck 2
Northern bobwhite 6
Ring-necked pheasant 8
Wild turkey 133
Great blue heron 5
Northern harrier 107
Sharp-shinned hawk 2
Cooper’s hawk 1
Bald eagle 27
Red-tailed hawk 84
Ferruginous hawk 5
Rough-legged hawk 15
Ring-billed gull 1
Rock pigeon 119
Eurasian collared-dove 119
Mourning dove 4
Barn owl 4
Eastern screech-owl 3
Great horned owl 4
Short-eared owl 11
Red-bellied woodpecker 23
Yellow-bellied sapsucker 2
Downy woodpecker 19
Hairy woodpecker 6
Northern flicker 36
American kestrel 10
Prairie falcon 3
Loggerhead shrike 2
Blue jay 4
American crow 7
Horned lark 40
Black-capped chickadee 4
Red-breasted nuthatch 1
White-breasted nuthatch 21
Brown creeper 6
Winter wren 1
Carolina wren 1
Golden-crowned kinglet 2
Eastern bluebird 38
Townsend’s solitaire 3
American robin 39
Northern mockingbird 2
European starling 10,114
Lapland longspur 2,056
Orange-crowned warbler 1
Yellow-rumped warbler 3
American Tree sparrow 208
Fox sparrow 2
Song sparrow 6
Harris’s sparrow 112
White-crowned sparrow 1
Dark-eyed junco 194
Northern cardinal 23
Red-winged blackbird 216,922
Meadowlark sp. 247
Common grackle 1
Great-tailed grackle 74
House finch 105
American goldfinch 44
House sparrow 192
Cheyenne Bottoms Christmas Bird Count results