Dec 29, 2014
Cheyenne Bottoms Christmas Bird Count
87 species
Greater White-fronted Goose 251
Snow Goose 63,000
Ross’s Goose 3
Cackling Goose 383
Canada Goose 2,052
Tundra Swann 4
Wood Duck 1
Gadwall 2
American Wigeon 10
Mallard 3,128
Blue-winged Teal 3
Northern Shoveler 18
Northern Pintail 463
Green-winged Teal 36
Canvasback 3
Redhead 84
Ring-necked Duck 11
Bufflehead 24
Common Goldeneye 69
Hooded Merganser 5
Common Merganser 2
Ruddy Duck 2
Ring-necked Pheasant 28
Wild Turkey 23
Pied-billed Grebe 3
Great Blue Heron 13
Black-crowned Night Heron 2
Bald Eagle 57
Northern Harrier 80
Cooper’s Hawk 2
Red-tailed Hawk 98
Ferruginous Hawk 2
Rough-legged Hawk 8
American Coot 31
Ring-billed Gull 94
Herring Gull 28
Rock Pigeon 80
Eurasian Collared-Dove 131
White-winged Dove 8
Mourning Dove 8
Barn Owl 14
Great Horned Owl 2
Red-bellied Woodpecker 11
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker 1
Downy Woodpecker 9
Hairy Woodpecker 4
Northern Flicker 63
American Kestrel 9
Peregrine Falcon 2
Prairie Falcon 2
Loggerhead Shrike 2
Blue Jay 8
American Crow 1
Horned Lark 477
Black-capped Chickadee 1
Red-breasted Nuthatch 4
White-breasted Nuthatch 15
Brown Creeper 2
Winter Wren 2
Marsh Wren 1
Carolina Wren 4
Golden-crowned Kinglet 3
Ruby-crowned Kinglet 1
Eastern Bluebird 7
American Robin 112
Northern Mockingbird 1
European Starling 1,620
Cedar Waxwing 15
Lapland Longspur 83
Yellow-rumped Warbler 1
Spotted Towhee 2
American Tree Sparrow 347
Field Sparrow 3
Song Sparrow 13
Lincoln’s Sparrow 1
Swamp Sparrow 1
Harris’s Sparrow 117
White-crowned Sparrow 4
Dark-eyed Junco 217
Northern Cardinal 14
Red-winged Blackbird 100,471
Western Meadowlark 44
Meadowlark sp. 429
Common Grackle 9
Great-tailed Grackle 100
House Finch 25
Pine Siskin 8
American Goldfinch 79
House Sparrow 368
Nineteen observers conducted the Cheyenne Bottoms CBC on Monday, December 29th. A chilly but clear and still morning provided good birding conditions; however, a weather front came in early in the afternoon, which brought falling temperatures and wind making conditions less than favorable. Much of Cheyenne Bottoms’s pools had open water providing good conditions for viewing waterfowl. 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, including parts of Great Bend, Hoisington, and Ellinwood. 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.
In all, we tallied 87 species and a total of 203,246 individuals with the following notes of interest: over 65,000 geese (most of which were Snow Geese), 4 Tundra Swans, 15 duck species (most of which were Mallards), 28 Ring-necked Pheasants, 13 Great Blue Herons, 57 Bald Eagles (which is an all-time high count for the Cheyenne Bottoms CBC), 80 Northern Harriers, 98 Red-tailed Hawks, 2 Ferruginous Hawks, 8 White-winged Doves, 14 Barn Owls, 63 Northern Flickers (which is the 2nd most recorded on this count), 15 White-breasted Nuthatches, 2 Winter Wrens, 1 Marsh Wren, 4 Carolina Wrens, 347 American Tree Sparrows, as well as 8 other Sparrow species, 473 Meadowlarks, and over 100,000 Red-winged Blackbirds.
