Felger's Annotated List of the Water Birds of Weld, Morgan and Adams Counties, Colorado, South to the First Sectional Line Below the Fortieth Parallel by A.H. Felger
ANNOTATED LIST OF THE WATER BIRDS OF WELD, MORGAN AND ADAMS COUNTIES, COLORADO, SOUTH To THE FIRST SECTIONAL LINE BECOW THE FORTIETH PARALLEL.
BY A. H. FELGER. With three maps. (From The Auk XVI, no. 3, July, 1909, pp. 272-291).
The list is a long one, especially so for a section of the country that we are not accustomed to think of as being particularly well situated for the abundant occurrence of water fowl. The recent abundance of these birds is attributed largely to the settlement and farming of the country, with the attendant construction of reservoirs and irrigating systems. Besides the authors' personal observations on the birds of the region during eleven years--1898 to 1909--he has drawn upon all the publisht sources of information available, making the list authoritative and apparently quite complete.
Many species of waders known to breed only in the far north were observed in varying numbers thru the sununer, giving rise to the suspicion that they might be found nesting in the region. While this may prove to be true in some instances, we believe it to be unsafe to assume as much from the mere occurrence of the birds during the summer months. Individuals of even such northern species as the Western Sandpiper and the Northern Phalarope are known to spend the summer as far south as southern California, and such of these as have been collected have always proved to be nonbreeding birds.
