{"id":126870,"date":"2026-04-29T18:39:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T00:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/19th-annual-ute-mountain-mesa-verde-birding-festival-kicks-off-next-week\/"},"modified":"2026-05-10T12:35:28","modified_gmt":"2026-05-10T18:35:28","slug":"19th-annual-ute-mountain-mesa-verde-birding-festival-kicks-off-next-week","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/19th-annual-ute-mountain-mesa-verde-birding-festival-kicks-off-next-week\/","title":{"rendered":"19th Annual Ute Mountain Mesa Verde Birding Festival kicks off next week"},"content":{"rendered":"

Baby gray horned owls and their mother, mostly hidden between its offspring, were spotted during the Ute Mountain Mesa Verde Birding Festival in 2016. The 19th Annual Ute Mountain Mesa Verde Birding Festival is scheduled to begin on Wednesday. (Journal file photo)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

The Ute Mountain Mesa Verde Birding Festival kicks off its 19th year next week with dinner receptions, bird watching tours and guest speakers.<\/p>\n

The festival, orchestrated by the Cortez Cultural Center, runs Wednesday through May 10. On Wednesday, lecture, reception and afternoon birding tour will commence the celebration.<\/p>\n

During the rest of the week, early morning and afternoon tours throughout Montezuma County will take attendees to open spaces such as Mesa Verde, Echo Basin, Denny Lake, the Upper Dolores River, and the Ute Mountain Ute Farm and Ranch for guided bird-watching.<\/p>\n

Sneed B. Collard III, this year\u2019s keynote speaker and author of \u201cBirding for Boomers,\u201d will present during a dinner and silent auction May 9.<\/p>\n

Pre-registration is required and costs $180 for access to all tours, $50 for a single tour and $55 for the keynote banquet. The proceeds will help fund the Cortez Cultural Center.<\/p>\n

The birding week is the biggest fundraiser for the center, which earned $16,000 from last year\u2019s festival. Attendees come from all across the nation, migrating in from as far as Pennsylvania, said Susan Lisak, Cortez Cultural Center executive director.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are so many avid birders,\u201d Lisak said. \u201cWhen somebody sees a unique bird, and they put it out online, all the birders flock to that bird.\u201d<\/p>\n

This festival elected the Green-tailed Towhee, a small olive-colored bird tinged with yellow with a bright crown, as its honorary bird representative.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were able to identify the Green-tailed Towhee at Mesa Verde National Park,\u201d Lisak said. \u201cWe\u2019re hoping on that tour that we\u2019re actually going to be able to find them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sticking with the theme, this May\u2019s exhibition at the Cultural Center is called \u201cWinged Horizons,\u201d bringing together bird-inspired artists. The opening reception is Friday at 5 p.m.<\/p>\n

The center will also sell bird-themed gifts such as \u201cbird-friendly coffee,\u201d whose producers aim to protect bird habitats impacted by coffee bean farming.<\/p>\n

Lisak witnessed her first festival a year ago after she started working for the Cultural Center and was shocked by the interest.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t realize what a cohesive group and how many birders there are until you put a festival out there,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Lisak said the festival brings people out from their homes and into the open spaces in the county, which provide a different kind of bird-watching not so accessible from a front porch.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is your chance to go out and find other types of birds,\u201d she said, adding that amateur bird watchers this year could become volunteer tour guides the next \u2013 something the center is always searching for.<\/p>\n

Registration for the festival along with the official schedule is available at utemountainmesaverdebirdingfestival.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

avanderveen@the-journal.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Experienced birders and newbies alike are welcome to register for tours and other celebratory events<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":126871,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[1894,510,28,29,6419],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-126870","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-birding","tag-festive-event-including-carnival","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter","tag-tj-trueanthem"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126870","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126870"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126870\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":128373,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126870\/revisions\/128373"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126871"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126870"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126870"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126870"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=126870"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}