Date: 10/30/26 6:46 pm From: <reports...> Subject: [cobirds] Mount Zion Hawk Watch at Windy Saddle Park (30 Oct 2026) 36 Raptors
Mount Zion Hawk Watch at Windy Saddle Park
Golden, Greater Denver, Colorado, USA
To see hourly weather data and details of migrant raptors, look up this watch at hawkcount.org.
This is a new raptor migration site identified and designated in mid-September 2024. This is Colorado's 1st fall hawk watch site, and the second hawk watch in Colorado.
To get to the site which is along Lookout Mountain Rd. in Golden, enter either Windy Saddle Park or Mount Zion into Google Maps on your favorite navigation app, or enter the coordinates 39.7368,-105.2454. From the parking lot ascend the stone steps to the watch site.
EVERYONE IS WELCOME TO THE HAWK WATCH TO ENJOY THE SPECTACLE OF RAPTOR MIGRATION, EVEN IF YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT IDENTIFYING RAPTORS IN FLIGHT. We will help you to learn Raptor ID if you are interested.
See https://groups.google.com/g/cobirds/c/Oznn4uc6MBk
Daily Raptor Counts: Oct 30, 2026
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Observation start time: 08:30:00
Observation end time: 15:30:00
Total observation time: 7 hours
Official Counter: Ajit Antony
Observers: Liza Antony
Visitors:
As soon as we got to the watch a trail runner asked us whether we were
looking at the sunrise. I explained about this hawk watch, and she offered
that she loves RTs. While I was looking at a non-migrant GE with my scope
and Liza with her binoculars we heard a voice asking what we were looking
at and I said A Golden Eagle, try and see where we are looking you should
be able to see it (as most hikers have never seen a GE and are thrilled to
be able to see one) and she couldn't she said, so I suggested she stand
behind me and look where I was looking with my scope and she was able to
see it. I told her it had a 7 ft wingspan and she was truly amazed.
Weather:
Weather.gov predicted dense fog over Golden, but I looked up
https://holfuy.com/en/weather/1295 which told me that the cloud base was
13,000 ft so I knew that Mount Zion would not be affected by the fog. When
we got to the watch it appeared that the fog, similar to a few days ago,
was actually low stratus clouds covering Denver. There was an overcast sky
mainly cirrus, so I knew the thermals would not be strong. In fact the
Thermal Soaring Index was poor with lift 0 ft per second, maximum height of
thermals would have been 2320 ft AGL except that there was no time given of
the time of trigger of 21.4� C indicating that the thermals would be low,
and that the haze would remain all day which it did.
Very dense fog covering Denver so that only the tops of 2 of the tallest
buildings was visible. By 11:30 a.m. MDT there was a very solid brown cloud
above the horizon between north and east and Denver was completely covered
by haze and could not be seen at all! The ESE winds blew the haze/pollution
toward the watch where it gradually accumulated at the SW end of the
Kestrel Channel/ Windy Saddle. By the 1:00 p.m. Denver could be faintly
seen and it stayed so for as long as we stayed at the watch.
Raptor Observations:
The first migrant was a juvenile NH which was hunting low in the Kestrel
Channel and could not be seen after it went behind a small ridge. We
counted it because there are no NH locally, then was vindicated when we saw
an NH flying 10 minutes later over Lookout Mountain migrating SSE. Because
of the low height of thermals most of the raptors used the ridge lift at
the Eastern end of Lookout Mountain or went through the gap between it and
Green Mountain.
Another good day for GE - 3 migrants and 2 local, one of which had white at
the base of its tail and minimal white in its wings without any obvious
molt, a 1st year GE.
An RT was doing its territorial roller coaster flight so I told Liza look
for another hawk it was displaying for. It was an adult GE flying below and
North of the ridge top of Lookout Mountain. The RT dove onto it 3 times and
each time the GE turned and presented its talons to the RT, eventually the
GE migrated after going over the Eastern rim of Lookout Mountain more than
5 minutes after we had seen it.
We stayed later this afternoon as they were migrants every hour, but there
were no low migrants over the 2 Table Mountains or anywhere else low in the
late afternoon.
Non-migrant raptors: AK 1, BE 1 adult initially over Green Mountain so it
looked like a migrant but it flew NE, RT
Non-raptor Observations:
2 paragliders at 11:00 a.m. at no lift at all and could not even rise up to
the level that they took off from, consistent with the Soaring Forecast! At
2:41 p.m. at moderate lift reaching a little higher than Lookout Mountain
which is 200 ft above Mount Zion.
A helicopter we have seen twice before with a long cable hanging below it
carrying 2 maintenance workers of high tension wires could be seen dropping
them off at various spots and picking them up, and in between hovering far
to the West, fortunately not directly over, noisily, as happened yesterday
Liza told me.
Predictions:
A 20 percent chance of showers after noon. Partly sunny, with a high near
62. Calm wind becoming north northeast around 6 mph in the afternoon.
The winds alofft are predicted to be light from the West, become North
which is an unusual wind for this watch without rain or snow, so it will be
interesting to see what this wind will bring us in the way of migrants from
Wyoming.
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Report submitted by Ajit Antony (<aiantony...>)
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