Cheyenne â High Plains Audubon Society
Cheyenne – High Plains Audubon Society Chartered by the National Audubon Society since 1974 Serving southeastern Wyoming Audubon members Flyer April 2015 Officers and Committee Chairs Barb Gorges, President, Programs 634-0463, [email protected] Dennis Saville, Secretary 632-1602, [email protected] Donna Kassel, Corresponding Secretary 634-6481 Chuck Seniawski, Treasurer, Webmaster 638-6519, [email protected] Mark Gorges, Newsletter, Membership 634-0463, [email protected] Art Anderson, Important Bird Areas 638-1286 Elizabeth Thums, Historian, Field Trips Greg Johnson, Bird Compiler, Checklist 634-1056, [email protected] Susan Parkins, Member at Large Jack Palma, Audubon Rockies Board [email protected] The CHPAS Flyer is published monthly as a benefit of chapter membership. Submissions are welcome. The current issue is available online at http://home.lonetree.com/ audubon. Please become a CHPAS member Send $12 and your name and mailing address to the chapter. Include your email address to get your newsletter digitally to save resources and see the photos in color. All chapter memberships expire Sept. 1. Any membership dues sent in after May 1 will pertain to the remainder of the current year and all of the following year. Cheyenne-High Plains Audubon Soc. P.O. Box 2502 Cheyenne, WY 82003-2502 http://home.lonetree.com/audubon If you would like to join the National Audubon Society, send $20 to NAS, PO Box 422250, Palm Coast, FL 32142-2250. Add the code C4ZZ53OZ and the $20 will be returned to CHPAS. Wyobirds e-list - Subscribe, post and/or read interesting sightings: http:// home.ease.lsoft.com/scripts/waHOME.exe?A0=WYOBIRDS. April 21— "Keeping track of our climate" —Nolan Doesken 7 p.m. in the Cottonwood Room at the Laramie County Library, 2200 Pioneer Ave. Ever wonder how climatologists know if we're getting warmer or colder, hotter or drier? Nolan Doesken will describe where all of our weather data come from and how climatologists track local and national patterns and trends. He will also talk about his favorite project -- CoCoRaHS (the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow network) -- where citizens anywhere in the country can help track storms. Climate data may sound boring -- but it's far from it! Come and find out for yourself. Nolan Doesken is the State Climatologist at the Colorado Climate Center at Colorado State University in Fort Collins. He has been tracking Rocky Mountain climate for nearly 40 years with a particular interest in local precipitation. After the Fort Collins flood of 1997, he helped start the Community Collaborative Rain, Hail and Snow network (CoCoRaHS) which has now spread nationwide and to Canada. April 25— Field trip: Pawnee Grasslands Leave at 8 a.m. from the parking lot in Lions Park south of the Children’s Village (next to the Old Community House). Car pooling may be available. We will head southeast, about a 1.5 hour-drive. The trip is open-ended so if you bring your own transportation, you are welcome to leave at any time. Bring lunch, water. Please call Field Trip Chair Elizabeth Thums, 649-2477, if you want notice of any changes in plans due to weather. May 9— Beginning Birding Class at Lions Park Meet at 8 a.m. in the Children’s Village. Free, open to the public of all ages. There will be a very quick introduction to the park’s most noticeable birds and there will be binoculars, if you need them, then a walk around the park for the next two hours. Joining us will be families taking part in Wyoming Game and Fish Department’s Forever Wild Families, so we would love to have all of you regulars to help introduce the beginners to birdwatching. At 10 a.m., back in the Children’s Village, CHPAS member Dennis Saville will present birding tips and an overview of resources to help you identify birds and learn more about them. Additional calendar dates April 21—Dinner with speaker The 2015 BioBlitz will bring together scientists and the public to survey for every type of organism we can find in the area within 24 We will be meeting our guest speaker, Nolan Doesken, hours. Teams of scientists, teachers, volunteers, environmental educators, at 5 p.m. at Anong’s Thai Cuisine, 620 Central Ave. If you would and community members join forces to find, identify, and learn about as like to join us, please call Mark at 634-0463. many local plant, insect and animal species as possible. Additional information is coming soon. April 28—CHPAS Board Meeting 7 p.m. Gorges home. Call 634-0463 if you’re coming. May 8—Cheyenne Country Club Survey 7 a.m. Contact Chuck if you wish to take part or be on his email notice list: 638-6519, [email protected]. Birdwatchers of all skill levels welcome. May 16—Big Day Bird Count 6 a.m. beginning at Lions Park and continuing to other Cheyenne birding hotspots. More info next newsletter. June 13-14—Audubon Rockies BioBlitz Heart Mountain Preserve, Cody —see the website at : http://wyomingbiodiversity.org/index.php?cID=643 July 10-13—NAS Convention —Leesburg, Virginia July 11-12—Field trip: Rocky Mountain National Park Rocky Mountain National Park is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year. This will be a one-to-two day trip. We’ll bird in the park and along Trail Ridge Road on our way to spending the night at Grandby so that we can bird the Windy Gap Wildlife Viewing Area and some other hotspots west of the park the next morning. Contact Elizabeth Thums for more information, 649-2477. President’s Message: Habitat Hero workshop a success! By Barb Gorges, 634-0463, [email protected] 100 people attended the Habitat Hero workshop, including the presenters. Only a few people registered were unable to come at the last minute. Everyone on the waiting list was given a chance to attend. Susan J. Tweit, plant biologist and award-winning author, http://susanjtweit.com, from Salida, Colorado, explained the importance of providing wildlife habitat, especially for beleaguered bees and butterflies, in our own yards. And especially with native plants. Also a landscape designer, she explained how wildscaping is similar to landscaping, but emphasizes layers of vegetation, water features, and native plants suited to the native wildlife. Jane Dorn, co-author with her husband, Robert Dorn, of “Growing Native Plants of the Rocky Mountain Area,” gave a rundown of plants from the book that are best suited to our high plains in southeastern Wyoming. Jamie Weiss, Habitat Hero program coordi- nator for Audubon Rockies made a short presentation and invited everyone to consider applying for recognition as a Habitat Hero this fall when applications will be accepted. Clint Bassett, water conservation specialist for the Cheyenne Board of Public Utilities explained where Cheyenne water comes from (some piped through a couple mountain ranges!) and was part of the afternoon panel that looked at specific yards and how they might be wildscaped. I’d like to thank the folks on the organizing committee with me: chair Mark Gorges, Jane Dorn, Jack Palma, Jamie Weiss, and our partners from Laramie County Master Gardeners, Jennifer Wolfe and Michelle Bohanan. Be a Habitat Hero: Waterwise Wildscaping resources “Growing Native Plants of the Rocky Mountain Area,” by Robert D. Dorn and Jane L. Dorn, is available at www.lulu.com as a print-on-demand book. Plans are underway to make it available digitally, as a disk. It has color photos of 500 native plants and information on how to grow them, and how to garden for wildlife. Native Plants for High Plains Habitats - Jane and Robert Dorn prepared this list of 114 trees, shrubs, annuals and perennial flowers and grasses for the Habitat Hero workshop held in Cheyenne March 2015. It includes description and availability notes for each species. Find the link at our chapter website: http:// home.lonetree.com/audubon/. Wyoming Wildscape – This is a Wyoming Game and Fish Department publication written and updated this spring by non-game bird biologist Andrea Orabona. It has specific gardening instructions and a plant list. Later in the summer of 2015, printed copies are to be available through WGFD. The link is also on the CHPAS website. The Habitat Hero program, managed by Audubon Rockies, has a website, www.HabHero.org, with a wide variety of information, including how to apply for recognition for your garden. The application season usually opens late summer. Mountains and Plains, The Ecology of Wyoming Landscapes do State University, an expert on Yellowstone’s ecology. Ecology is the study of how geology, climate, fauna and flora interact within an area, but rather than writing a textbook, this book is written for all of us who work or recreate in the Wyoming Dennis Knight was the sole aulandscape and want to know more about thor of the first edition of “Mountains and what is going on. Plains, The Ecology of Wyoming LandThere have been a lot of changscapes,” published in 1994. Now Universies in the last 20 years, a lot of new stoty of Wyoming professor emeritus, this ries: pine beetles, re-introduced wolves, time he enlisted the help of three colsage-grouse issues. leagues for the second edition that came At the related website, out at the end of 2014: George Jones, assowww.mountainsandplains.net , you can ciate director of the Wyoming Natural ask questions and check for updates. Diversity Database at UW (where the The book can be ordered from book’s royalties are going); William major booksellers. The Wyoming State Reiners, professor emeritus, UW; and Wil- Museum store is carrying it. liam Romme, professor emeritus, ColoraMountains and Plains, The Ecology of Wyoming Landscapes, second edition, by Dennis H. Knight, George P. Jones, William A. Reiners, William H. Romme, c. 2014, Yale University. Published by Yale University Press with assistance from the University of Wyoming Biodiversity Institute. Softcover, 404 pages, $45. Colorado Front Range field trip March 21 sunny and bird-full By Mark Gorges Starting at Rawhide Power Plant and ending at Fossil Creek Reservoir and Open Space, 36 species were seen by the 11 people on the field trip. Canada Goose Gadwall American Wigeon Mallard Blue-winged Teal Northern Shoveler Northern Pintail Redhead Lesser Scaup Bufflehead Common Goldeneye Common Merganser Red-breasted Merganser Ruddy Duck Pied-billed Grebe Horned Grebe Eared Grebe Western Grebe American White Pelican Great Blue Heron Bald Eagle Northern Harrier Red-tailed Hawk American Kestrel American Coot Killdeer Ring-billed Gull Downy Woodpecker Black-billed Magpie American Crow Horned Lark Mountain Bluebird Scoping out birds at Rawhide Reservoir overlook. Photo byMark Gorges. American Robin Song Sparrow Red-winged Blackbird Western Meadowlark Before leaving Lions Park in the morning, we also saw: Northern Flicker Blue Jay Cheyenne Country Club survey results for March 27 By Chuck Seniawski Four people, including Richard Gilbert, Jerry Johnson and Mark Gorges, spent an hour and a half and saw 21 species (plus 2 other taxa). It was 44 degrees, breezy, mostly a clear sky. Canada Goose 32 American Wigeon 1 Mallard 12 Ring-necked Duck 4 Lesser Scaup 20 Great Blue Heron 1 Red-tailed Hawk 2 American Coot 2 Rock Pigeon (Feral Pigeon) 2 Eurasian Collared-Dove 5 Black-billed Magpie 3 American Crow 7 Tree Swallow 1 (seen only in silhouette, but clearly had a square tail and swallowlike behavior as it flew) Mountain Chickadee 2 Red-breasted Nuthatch 4 American Robin 3 European Starling 7 Dark-eyed Junco (Slate-colored) 2 Dark-eyed Junco (Oregon) 1 Dark-eyed Junco (Pink-sided) 3 Red-winged Blackbird 9 Great-tailed Grackle 3 House Sparrow 4 Cheyenne – High Plains Audubon Society P.O. Box 2502 Cheyenne, WY 82003 Choose from a litany of native plants suited to our High Plains From a list prepared by Jane and Robert Dorn. See the list, including scientific names, plant descriptions and commercial availability at http://home.lonetree.com/ audubon/HabHero/ LandscapingwithnativeplantsDorn&Dorn.pdf. Coniferous Trees White Fir White Spruce Black Hills Spruce Colorado Blue Spruce Rocky Mtn. Bristlecone Pine Pinyon Pine Limber Pine Ponderosa Pine Rocky Mountain Juniper Deciduous Trees Bigtooth Maple Boxelder Common Hackberry Green Ash Lanceleaf Cottonwood Narrowleaf Cottonwood Plains Cottonwood Quaking Aspen Gambel Oak Rocky Mountain White Oak Bur Oak Mossycup Oak New Mexico Locust Peachleaf Willow Large Shrubs, 10’ to 20’ tall Rocky Mountain Maple Western Serviceberry Curlleaf Mountainmahogany Wild Mockorange Wild Plum Western Chokecherry Threeleaf Sumac Skunkbush Sumac Lemonade Sumac Smooth Sumac Nannyberry Medium to Short Shrubs, up to 10’ tall Leadplant Greenleaf Manzanita Green Manzanita Bearberry Kinnikinnick Silver Sagebrush Big Sagebrush Shrubby Primrose Sundrops Fendler Ceanothus Littleleaf Mountainmahogany Fernbush Redosier Dogwood Rubber Rabbitbrush Apacheplume New Mexico Privet Mountainspray Cliffbush Cliff Jamesia Waxflower Common Juniper Ground Juniper Creeping Juniper Rug Juniper Winterfat Shrubby Cinquefoil Littleleaf Mockorange Western Sandcherry Bitterbrush Antelope Bitterbrush Golden Currant Yellow Currant Wax Currant Boulder Raspberry Thimbleberry Canadian Buffaloberry Russet Buffaloberry Non-woody Perennials and Annuals Sand Verbena Yarrow Bluestar Plains Pussytoes Low Everlasting Western Columbine Annual Prickly Poppy Fringed Sage Orange Butterflyweed Orange Milkweed Chocolate Flower Winecups Purple Poppymallow Purple Beeplant Purple Prairie Clover Hoary Spinyaster Purple Coneflower Hummingbird Flower Firechalice Ovalleaf Buckwheat Cushion Wild Buckwheat Sulphur Flower Spotted Joepyeweed Common Blanketflower James Cranesbill Annual Sunflower Maximilian Sunflower Bush Morningglory Scarlet Gilia Prairie Blazingstar Tansyleaf Spinyaster Tenpetal Blazingstar Horsemint Wild Bergamot Basin Butterweed Narrowleaf Penstemon Sidebells Penstemon Bush Penstemon Phlox Penstemon Eaton Penstemon Firecracker Penstemon Hairy Penstemon Largeflower Penstemon Palmer Penstemon Beakflowered Penstemon Rocky Mountain Penstemon Mexican Hat Prairie Coneflower Blackeyed Susan Narrowleaf Butterweed Broom Groundsel Soft Goldenrod Western Spiderwort Yucca Spanish Bayonet Desert Paperflower Golden-flowered Prairie Zinnia Grasses Indian Ricegrass Big Bluestem Sideoats Grama Blue Grama Buffalo Grass Prairie Sandreed Basin Wildrye Giant Wildrye Western Wheatgrass Bluebunch Wheatgrass Idaho Fescue Switchgrass Little Bluestem
© Copyright 2024