My owl friends: The Early Bird Gets The Worm

My plan was to get up early so I could be over to my owl friends before sunrise.
Usually that would pretty easy for me but not today. I was up late watching women's
basket ball games, so it was a bit of a challenge. But finally I dragged myself downstairs
to feed the kitties and make the coffee. I didn't quite beat the sunrise...I'd call it a tie.

I hustled down the trail to see my owl friends. I was hoping I may catch some activity
before they settled in for the day. I quickly found Sonny relaxing on a branch on the north
side of the trail and not far from the nest. I said good morning and snapped a couple of pics.

I walked over to nest to say hi to Cher but she wasn't in the nest. I quickly found
her just to the right of the nest.

She was on high alert! A few crows showed up and started harassing Sonny. He flew a bit farther from the nest to draw the crows away from his kids. Crows and owls are arch enemies

so Cher was ready if they tried to get to the owlets. Luckily the crows got bored and flew off.

I knew Cher would be heading back to the nest pretty soon, so I was very hopeful of getting some flight shots. I only waited a few minutes before the action started. First she flew to a branch closer to the nest, they she flew across the path before finally landing back in the nest.

That was so fun! I like getting there first thing in the morning. The light is good and there are a lot less people around than in the evenings.

Besides the owls, I also came to find the bluebirds. There have been quite a few postings about a pair of eastern bluebirds at Twin Lakes. They usally do not come this far west, so I figured I'd give it a go. I searched for a bit but saw nothing, so I headed back to my car. A fellow photographer- David showed up just as I got back to the car. He was in search of the bluebirds so I decided to join him. We walked around for a bit with no luck. Just as we were about to give up, the female landed in a nearby tree and posed so nicely for us!

The male did not show himself but I feel confident I'll get a pic soon!

Twin Lakes also is where a local balloon company starts their flights. So I had to grab

a few balloon pics.

I said good bye to David and headed over to see the dippers. Just as I got out of the car, I spotted a red tailed hawk in a tree. So I headed over to get some pics. He did not disappoint and gave me some sweet flight shots!

Finally I pulled myself away and walked over the dippers. There they were doing

their thing.......getting breakfast and working on the nest.

My next stop was to a new trail to me. I had met a fellow photographer at Prospect Park last week. He told me there was a GBH rookery off 120 ave in Broomfield. He said you could get pretty close for photos. Sweet! I know where two rookerys are but they are on private land and too far off the road to get decent pics. This place is only about 15 minutes from my house and I love checking out new spots, so I headed over......

Well, this place did not disappoint! There were about 5 GBH nests right above a nice pond.