Great day in the mountains, Nutcracker, Pinyon, Solitaire, Cassins

Hi all,

Today, Paul Marivn and myself went to the Sunset Trail at mile marker 19 to look for the birds list above.  We went out the Sunset Trail I believe it is, almost right across from the Porta Potty's at mile marker 19.  We went nearly a quarter mile and took the trail to the left.  We wound down the hill and then came to a spot where you cross over a very mini grated ramp, then went left to stay on the left side of the meadow.  A bit later, we heard the Pinyon Jays and had a flock of about 150 birds fly directly over our heads.  Let's just say that if any of the pooped, we would have known.  We continued on and went past Los Rosarias Lake and had multiple sightings of the Clark's Nutcrackers.  After the lake, we continued on and as we started a small uphill climb, we noticed that there were a ton of birds in this area.  I thought I had the Townsend's Solitaire, but it wouldn't allow me better looks and then was gone, oh well.  We continued on to Big Laguna Lake without much to report other than two Merlin's chasing each other.  We came back to the hot spot with a ton of birds and it was still alive.  I ran into Scott and while I was talking to him, I saw a bird and looked closer and there, we all got our Townsend's Solitaire.  Scott went on to the lake and we headed back to our car.  We got by the lake again and there were two Clark's Nutcrackers in the trees by the big ravine area by Los Rosarias Lake.  As we were coming back up the trail that splits off of the Sunset Trail, I told Paul that this was the spot where we saw the Pinyon Jay's a couple of weeks ago and suddenly thought I saw something.  I walked up there and found the large flock, feeding on the ground and in the tree's.  A nice way to finish the day.  The link below is to our e-bird list.