Boreal Owl and a Hard Hit 3/10

On my lunch break I made another quick trip to Timnath Reservoir. As I pulling up to the parking area, so was John Shenot, a birder I have met only one other time also at Timnath. Again, there was a ton of birds there. The Horned Grebe numbers still continue to rise as did the Lesser Scaup numbers. While scanning 3 Killdeer flew in and landed 100 yards to our west, about a minute later they scrammed and a Sharp-shinned Hawk was almost on them, but missed. While scanning through the large numbers of Cackling Geese I was able to find a hybrid Cackling x Snow Goose and a pure white Snow Goose.
After work I made a stop at Kechter Pit and the wintering Mourning Doves were still in their usual spot. I again saw a Lesser Black-backed Gull, but it was a 2nd year bird instead of an adult which I saw there on the 8th. The Great Blue Heron numbers continue to rise as I counted 12 in total and there was one laying down in the nest.
Denise Bretting, Sol Miller, and I decided to head up towards Cameron Pass to look for Boreal Owl. When we started out we made a quick stop at the Grandview Cemetery and saw the Great Horned Owl that is sitting on her nest. We also saw 2 Red-breasted Nuthatches coming down to the ground right at our feet at a small wet patch of mud. We then drove up Rist Canyon looking for Northern Pygmy-Owl, but wasn't able to find any. We made a couple of stops for Northern Saw-whet Owls on the way up, but just like the Pygmy we couldn't locate any.
Then while we went around a corner there were some deer in the middle of the road and I hit the breaks, but all was to late. One of the deer was right in my way, just as it jumped. As we got the car stopped I went to check on the damage on my car expecting the trip to be over right then and there. Miraculously there was one spot that it chipped the paint and the hood was pushed up a little bit, but it appears as nothing had happened to the car except collect a lot of deer hair. We then went and checked on the deer and was disappointed to find out we broke her back. Sol then went and talked to a local who was in his car and he said he would go and get his .22 so she didn't suffer anymore. Sol and Denise said they didn't want to see it, so we left.
We made several stops on the Larimer County side of Cameron Pass hoping to hear a Boreal Owl, but nothing. So, we decided to go up and over to start at the Moose Visitor Center. A couple of miles before the visitor center we saw a car pulled over with two guys standing outside. I asked if they were looking for owls and they said they had a Boreal Owl calling right now. When then quickly pulled off the road and heard the owl. Come to find out these birders were Kevin Cook of Loveland and David Steingraeber of Fort Collins (actually he lives above Horsetooth Reservoir and I am not quite sure which town he officially lives in, but close enough). We then left them and continued on. We found out they were having a night time snowshoe party at the Moose Visitor Center and I was able to talk to Deb McLachlan who is the compiler of the North Park CBC and a bird rehabilitator. She also gets Rosy-Finches at her house in the winter time. She told me about a Summer Tanager that she photographed in November. It was nice to talk with her as it has been a couple years since I have had the privilege to do so.
We left making several stops looking for Boreal Owls again. We eventually heard 5 in Jackson County, 3 of which was at one stop and 2 in Larimer County. Boreal Owl was a life bird for Denise and my 136th Larimer County year bird. It was such a nice night up on Cameron Pass as we could see a ton of stars lighting up the sky and got great looks at 3 planets (Venus, Mars, and Jupiter). There was also no wind, which made up for a great night of owling and it only got down to 15 degrees at the coldest.
n the way down we saw 2 moose in the middle of the road, we were lucky to not hit one of those.
On our way back down we again made several attempts at Northern Saw-whet. In the upper Rist Canyon almost to the Stove Prairie School we eventually got a Northern Saw-whet Owl (137) to give a single call note back to us that all three of us heard. It was to high pitched to be a Northern Pygmy-Owl and it had the same quality as the tape we had been playing.
Overall a good night, but it could have been much better. I am not disappointed at all though as we heard and saw 9 owls (7 Boreal, 1 Northern Saw-whet, and 1 Great Horned) and really no damage on my car after hitting a deer.