Did you hang your binoculars up for the winter? Not so fast! The Denver metro area has a plethora of rich birding sites to explore, even on the coldest of winter days.
Being a Denver-based birding guide with Birding Man, I have come to know this city and its birding hotspots well. Yes, the mile high city is landlocked and isn’t home to as many species as you might find along the coast, but its location near several large reservoirs at the foot of the Rockies lends itself to excellent birding throughout the year.
Right now, in late February and early March, as we experience some of the coldest temperatures of the year, giant flocks of cackling and Canada geese seek out open water on nearby reservoirs and municipal lakes. Taking a closer look at these flocks can often reveal northern visitors like snow goose, Ross’s goose, and greater white-fronted goose. Colorful ducks cloaked in nuptial plumage dazzle observers as they make their way along front range reservoirs and western raptors stake out their next prairie dog meal from high vantage points along the open plains.
Ready to brave the cold? Check out my top 5 winter birding spots in Denver!
5. South Platte Park & Carson Nature Center
I’d suggest starting at South Platte Park and the Carson Nature Center. The park features lush riparian ecosystems that are home to over 225 species of birds. You can get close looks at waterfowl in the river. Find the duck with the heaviest bill in North America – norther shovelers –in small congregations swimming in circles, creating vortices that pull up food from the lake bottom. Other stunning ducks include common goldeneye, bufflehead, lesser and greater (uncommon) scaup, redhead, and canvasback. Come back in May and these birds will be long gone, setting up northern breeding territories. Enjoy them now!
The feeders and shrubs behind the nature center draw in flocks of white-crowned sparrow, song sparrow, and spotted towhee. Check these birds carefully and you might find an errant Harris’s sparrow mixed in with them. This beautiful sparrow is typically found farther east in the great plains, but every winter, multiple Harris’s sparrows are found throughout the Denver metro area.
Walk along the trails behind the nature center, and you might turn up a small colorful raptor hunting rodents. Making judgements based on its pointed tail, the hovering flight, and black malar (facial) stripes, you’ve accurately identified the bird as an American kestrel, separating it from other falcons like merlin and prairie falcon. But try to go beyond just the initial identification. Does it have gray wings? Yes? You’re looking at a male; the female has brown wings.
On even the slowest birding days, you’ll likely find northern flicker, a colorful woodpecker with a noticeable white patch on the rump. Pay attention to the color of the wing lining. In the west, we have the “red-shafted” subspecies; you should easily see the red on the wings when it flies. The eastern subspecies is the “yellow-shafted,” showing clear yellow wing linings and a red crescent on the nape (neck). These are fun details we can look for when we are birding; look close enough and you might find an intergrade between the two groups.
Listen for the raucous and unmistakable rattle of the belted kingfisher as it zooms back and forth over open waterways. Does it have a reddish-brown (rufous) belly band? If so, it’s a female. How is it hunting with so little open water? These are the questions that you’ll ask yourself as you begin to unfurl the vast and boundless world of nature.
The winter months are the best time to find fun surprises like long-tailed duck, white-winged scoter, and Barrow’s goldeneye. These are birds that aren’t regularly expected in the Denver metro area but can get blown off course or mixed into flocks of birds we typically see. Taking in the site of a male Barrow’s goldeneye – with its white face crescent – as it dives next to a spot-faced common goldeneye is a fantastic opportunity to compare and contrast these two species.
4. Prospect Park & Wheat Ridge Greenbelt
I live in Arvada, which is only about a 10 – 15-minute drive to this ribbon of riparian and aquatic habitat in the middle of the Denver suburbs. A visit to the Wheat Ridge Greenbelt will almost always graced with some kind of bird magic, even in the doldrums of winter. I recently led a free public bird walk here with Denver Audubon and we were able to spend time observing different kinds of waterfowl, songbirds, and raptors.
The winter is a great time to look for waterfowl as they sport their most vivid plumage of the year. Look for elegant drake hooded mergansers with their rounded crests, yellow eyes, and strongly contrasting black, white, and chestnut feathers. If you can, try to capture a photo of them in action tossing back a hapless crayfish.
Other waterfowl you might find are mallard, American wigeon, gadwall, ring-necked duck, wood duck, green-winged teal, and northern pintail.
In mid-February, listen for the duetting of breeding great horned owls. This is a great spot to look for their nests. This has also been a reliable place to find snags with tree cavities that are home to eastern screech owl.
Walk the cattail boardwalk just east of Bass Lake and listen for the harsh, scolding calls of the marsh wren. If you’re patient enough, you might be able to catch a glimpse of this elusive songbird.
You may even get lucky to hear or see a Virginia rail – a secretive chicken-like bird of the wetlands – among this area, but your chances are best in the early morning. Other birds that make the Wheatridge Greenbelt special in winter are Cooper’s hawk, bushtit, swamp sparrow, belted kingfisher, American dipper, and the occasional Wilson’s snipe, winter wren, and rusty blackbird. Last winter, birders descended upon the greenbelt with reports of a vagrant Cape May warbler, a bird that was seen continuing for several days.
And if the birds have you here early, you'll likely to reap other rewards. Early mornings offer great chances to find mammals like white-tailed deer, mink, coyote, and bobcat.
3. Cherry Creek State Park
Cherry Creek is a 4200-acre park centered around a flood-control reservoir located about 13 miles southeast of downtown Denver. It is heavily visited in the summer, congested with boats and cars, but come here during the winter and your experience will be very different. Local birders know Cherry Creek as a hotspot for gulls, ducks, loons, and grebes. The reservoir is not small – it encompasses 880 acres – so bring a spotting scope to identify distant birds. Fall is the best time for loons and grebes, but winter typically dishes up a fair share of fun birds.
Head to the marina and search the colonies of ring-billed gulls for more uncommon species like California gull and American herring gull. The two latter species should stick out because of their larger size, darker mantle (back), and red gonydeal spot. Pay attention to the color of the iris. Is it yellow or dark? In adult birds, a yellow iris means you’ve got an American herring gull. A dark iris would indicate a California gull. You may get lucky and find a particularly large gull that looks like it’s taken an elbow to the eye; a lesser black-backed gull. And if you’re really lucky, you might find a rare glaucus gull or Iceland gull.
Additionally, keep your eyes peeled for bald eagles out on the ice and flocks of common mergansers flying with their necks stretched out.
If you can get to the Cherry Creek Crossing trailhead at dusk or dawn, search the cattail marshes for Virginia rail. From there, head south into the open areas along the Railroad Bend Trail. Look for northern harrier, a disc-faced hawk resembling a cross between an owl and an eagle, hunting low over the fields. Its bright white rump is a telltale field mark. Birders call the rich gray male “the gray ghost.” American tree sparrow, marsh wren, and northern shrike are all possibilities here as well.
Further down the road, stop at the Wetlands Trailhead and go for a loop hike, searching for songbirds and raptors. Sometimes great horned owl nests here and several winters long-eared owl has been spotted here. Please remember to be respectful and stay a wide berth from nests. Birds have been known to abandon their nests when people get too close.
When you aren’t seeing much else, you’ll likely still see some mixed flocks of black-capped chickadees and dark-eyed juncos. Can you find a black-capped chickadee with a subtle white eyebrow? It might be a hybrid with a mountain chickadee. Look for differences among the juncos. In the winter, Colorado is home to 5 subspecies of dark-eyed junco: gray-headed (our breeder), Oregon, pink-sided, slate-colored, and white-winged (rare). No day is boring when you look a little deeper!
2. Chatfield State Park & Waterton Canyon
While you’re in the southern metro area, you’d be smart to make a stop at Chatfield State Park. This 5,000+ acre park is home to Chatfield Reservoir, open grasslands, riparian woodlands and cattail marshes around the Plum Creek and South Platte River. Bring your scope and head to the marina, where you can inspect the spit for waterfowl and gulls. While scanning, you may find western, pied-billed, eared and horned grebes (through December), red-necked grebe, red-breasted merganser, common loon, and in the early and late winter possibly Pacific loon, red-throated loon, or even yellow-billed loon. At the marina, look for anomalous gulls sitting on the pilings.
Chatfield is also a great place to look for bald eagles, particularly in February when their numbers can be quite inflated due to the arrival of migratory birds.
As you’re leaving Chatfield State Park, take a left and head south on Route 121. Turning left onto Waterton Road, you’ll pass Denver Audubon’s Kingery Nature Center on the way to Waterton Canyon. I’d be remiss not to mention the birding opportunities that await at the Kingery Nature Center (named in honor of Hugh and Urling Kingery, two local champion birders, educators, and environmental activists), but it is better in the spring and summer when migrant landbirds have returned. The property’s Redstart Woods is one of the few places in Colorado where American redstarts breed. Come in May and you can observe birds up close at the Birding Conservatory of the Rockies’ banding station.
Waterton Canyon is one of the best places to find wintering American dippers. North America’s only aquatic songbird remains active here all winter and its acrobatic foraging behavior is always a joy to watch.
This is also a great spot to find Townsend’s solitaire (North America’s only solitaire species), canyon wren, Woodhouse’s scrub jay, and golden eagle.
1. Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge
There is no doubt in my mind that the Arsenal is Denver’s richest birding hotspot in the winter, and quite possibly in the summer as well. Colorado birder extraordinaire and author Ted Floyd has called the Arsenal “inarguably the greatest birding and natural history hotspot in all of Colorado.”
A winter’s drive along the famed Wildlife Auto Tour Road is bound to result in a wonderful assortment of wintering raptors. My favorite is the ferruginous hawk, North America’s largest hawk that specializes in hunting prairie dogs throughout the winter. You may find one of these menacing predators on the ground, stalking around like a velociraptor in pursuit of a hot meal. Look for its long gape, reminiscent of the joker and his eerie smile.
In my opinion, the Arsenal is one of the best places in Denver to find rare morphs of the Red-tailed hawk, such as Krider’s hawk and Harlan’s hawk.
Along the way, keep your eyes peeled for prairie falcon, merlin, and northern harrier. You may get lucky and find a close relative of the ferruginous hawk, the rough-legged hawk. Like ferruginous hawks, roughies have feathered tarsier, or feathers covering the legs, reaching the top of the talons. On soaring birds, look for a dark belly and two dark patches at the bend of the underwing.
The extensive short-grass prairie in this area makes every cottonwood and Russian olive attractive to great horned owls. Several breed here every year. And of course I should mention the bald eagle, a bird that abounds here and what persuaded the first biologists to protect this area by designating it as a National Wildlife Refuge.
Make the most of the winter here in Denver and enjoy its natural heritage. If you are building a year bird list on eBird, you’ll want to focus on the birds that are only here during the winter so you add them while you still can. Can you beat your personal numbers from last year?
Our State Parks do require you to have a State Park Pass or you will need to pay a $10 entry fee to get in. Consider opting into the $29 “Keep Colorado Wild Pass” the next time you register your vehicle, and you’ll save more than 60% on the traditional Annual State Parks Pass. Alternatively, hire a naturalist guide to get you into the Parks for free and improve your birding skills substantially.
Have fun out there. Happy birding!
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