Colorado, Part 2: Iconic American Wildlife

Before I left for Colorado I made two wish lists, one for new birds and one for wildlife. As a large western state with high elevations, the Rocky Mountains and eastern plains, it offers a wide range of wildlife not seen in my smaller, coastal New Jersey. I appreciate that I can sit on a beach near home and see whales and dolphins, but I won’t run into a moose or elk anywhere in the Garden State. There were many wild animals I wanted to see, but only a few days to see what I could. There was a potential list of dozens of animals that could be seen besides birds that included snakes, lizards, butterflies, moths, dragonflies and other insects. However, I kept my list short and reasonable with mostly mammals as targets.

Summit of Mt. Blue Sky Interpretive Area. © S. Weiss

Denver, Colorado is nicknamed The Mile High City because it is 5,280 feet above sea level. Evergreen, CO (our base for the trip) is almost 2,000 feet higher. The sign above is accessed by the highest paved road in North America, reaching 14,130 feet above sea level. The summit is above the surrounding tree line and is one of over 50 mountain peaks in the state over 14,000 feet high. Hikers worldwide refer to them as 14ers. The ruins on the right were once the Crest House, a restaurant and gift shop destroyed by fire. It had been the highest operating business structure in the country.

Like some of the new birds that I saw, I didn’t have to try hard to find some wild animals. Just as we turned into my cousin’s neighborhood, we were witness to a heard of elk grazing in the open space between a few houses. Elk are free roaming and were basically everywhere we went, thus often a nuisance. These large beasts (about five feet tall at the shoulders) walk freely through the neighborhoods and are as common on front lawns as a squirrel is in NJ. I have seen elk before at the Grand Canyon, but not as many or as close as these.

Elk weren’t actually on my need-to-see list, but it’s close relative, the moose was. It’s incredible to imagine that a full-grown moose is about two feet taller than an elk! At nearly seven feet tall, it is the tallest animal in North America. My cousin took us for a hike at a location he felt would be the best chance of seeing moose. Unfortunately, we didn’t catch sight of one, though I did find somewhat fresh moose tracks. I know we didn’t miss one. Something as massive as that couldn’t be missed. The stunning scenery on the hike was a great consolation. We did see a common golden-mantled ground squirrel and Colorado’s state flower, the blue columbine, along the trail.

Left, blue columbine. Right, moose tracks in the mud. © S. Weiss

Common golden-mantled ground squirrel. © S. Weiss

Black bears also eluded us on this trip. We did not specifically look for bears, but my cousin said they were not uncommon to see strolling across the open space behind his house in the morning or early evening. If I was to encounter a bear, then safely sitting on his deck watching it move past would have been good enough for me.

While hiking and driving through the mountainous terrain, we spotted yellow-bellied marmots and an American pika. The marmot is the largest of the ground squirrels and closely related to our groundhogs. In fact, marmots and groundhogs in the same genus, Marmota. The first couple that we saw were timid and ran for cover in nearby rocks. Eventually we saw several just relaxing and sunbathing. If not for my wife’s keen eye, we would have driven right past the only pika we would see. It is an adorable looking little mammal. At under nine inches long, it’s less than half the size of a marmot.

Yellow-bellied marmots. © S. Weiss

American pika. © S. Weiss

Two mammals on my must-see list were mountain goat and bighorn sheep, both iconic Rocky Mountain residents. It was on our travels up some of the high elevation mountain passes that we came across these two closely related ungulates. We were lucky enough to see single animals and small herds with kits or lambs; many not particularly concerned about us photographing them.

Bighorn sheep. © S. Weiss

Bighorn sheep have horns, not antlers like moose and elk. Both sexes (rams and ewes) have horns, though a ram's are bigger and distinctly curved backwards. The sheep do not shed their horns like the antlered animals. The horns are permanent parts of the skull and continue to grow throughout the animal’s life.

Mountain goat nanny and her kid. © S. Weiss

Mountain goats, like bighorn sheep have lifelong horns. A nanny’s (female) horns are narrower than those of a billy (male), and are curved only at the top.

Mountain goat billies roughhousing. © S. Weiss

The horns of billies are wider at the base than those of nannies. The billy's horns have a gradual backward curve starting from the base.

Two of my most anticipated animals to see on this trip nearly went the way of the American dipper I wanted to see but didn’t (see Part 1). I could not possibly visit Colorado and leave without seeing a buffalo, or American bison. My cousin drove me to a known location where one can find buffalo. A ten-minute drive from his house is the Buffalo Herd Overlook at Genesee Park. When we arrived, there were no bison to see from the parking lot of the refuge. Before giving up on seeing these American icons, we walked partially down the outer edge of the field and, in the distance, there I saw a small herd, maybe a couple dozen. We walked a little further around the perimeter to get a closer look at the magnificent beasts. By the time we reached the spot where they were grazing, they had already moved back towards the tree line for some shade. We still had good looks at them and got to see some of the massive bulls rolling their backs in the dirt. These animals are all direct descendants of wild buffalo from Yellowstone National Park. Living symbols of Americana, it is mind blowing for me to imagine what it would have been like 200 years ago to see millions (over 30 million) of them freely roaming the west before they nearly were slaughtered to extinction by irresponsible hunting. The population will never regain those historical highs, but at least they are now protected.

Bison are the largest land animals in North America. A full-grown bull stands about six feet at the shoulders and weighs nearly one ton. Like the mountain goat and bighorn sheep, bulls and cows both have horns. A bull’s horns are thicker than those of a cow. His horns grow out from the side of the head and turn upright. A cow’s horns grow out and curve in towards her face.

As we were saying goodbye to my cousins to make our way back to the airport in Denver, I realized that there was yet one more animal I hadn’t seen and another symbol of America’s great wilderness, a prairie dog. Our hosts told us that the best place to see them were the open fields along the airport access road once we exited the highway. As soon as we left Highway 70 onto Peña Boulevard, my wife and I started scanning both sides of the roadway for black-tailed prairie dogs. I pulled over when I noticed patches of disturbed dirt, like small mounds, scattered in a sparsely grassy area. I pulled off to the shoulder so traffic could continue past. The other motorists were indifferent to prairie dogs possibly in the area. Using binoculars to make a quick scan of the field through the front passenger window, I spotted our first and only prairie dog, sitting upright next to a burrow. The traffic was zipping too fast past my driver’s side door to even attempt to get out of the car for better looks. The safer alternative was to swap out the binoculars for my camera and take some distant photographs for posterity.

Slightly more than a foot long excluding its black-tipped tail, prairie dogs are members of the squirrel family. They do not completely hibernate in winter and are considered a keystone species.

It was a nice end to a great visit to Colorado, thanks to my cousins and their over-the-top hospitality. I will definitely be heading back out there with another list of things to do and see. The top of that list will most certainly include a moose and a dipper.