Here, since 1967, near Agate Fossil Beds National Monument, my partner and I have taken part in the annual Breeding Bird Survey for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Part of one of our survey routes, Highway 29, crosses the monument’s west end. We know the area—in June at least—quite intimately, when there is nothing quite so beautiful as a sunrise over these flower-dotted, green-grassed rolling hills along the Niobrara.
We go many kilometers and make many bird counting stops, then we drop into the little valley where the Niobrara flows and suddenly we hear and see birds in such rapid succession that we have difficulty getting them all named in the three minutes allowed us under the survey rules. Actually, three stops are influenced by the river: on the south edge we have found a common nighthawk, a lark sparrow, and a Say’s phoebe; on the north end the rock wren sings its un-wrenlike song. Near the bridge, where a narrow belt of shrubs and trees—mostly willows—hugs the river, we have logged the following: common flicker, a red-headed woodpecker, eastern and western kingbirds, western wood peewees, a blue jay, black-capped chickadees, house wrens, a brown thrasher, robins, yellow warblers, black-billed magpies, common grackles, black-headed grosbeaks, American goldfinches, and the non-native house sparrow and starling. Only once did we see or hear a black-billed cuckoo.
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Red-winged blackbird chick
Long-billed curlew chick
Long-billed marsh wren
