Cache la Poudre Trail
Birding Top to Bottom
This trail, based in Fort Collins, allows easy access to almost every habitat in northern Colorado, from high-elevation forest to high-quality shortgrass prairie. Some of the sites here are right in the middle of town; some are breathtakingly remote. High in the mountains, the Cache la Poudre River is born as a trickle beneath the feet of ptarmigan. Descending into the spruce woods, it grows into a stream serenaded by Boreal Owls and boreal toads, battled over by bighorn sheep. In the canyon it enjoys a rebellious adolescence, moshing with whitewater rafters and Common Mergansers, before finally maturing into a cottonwood-lined river of the plains. This trail allows easy access to almost every habitat in northern Colorado, from high-elevation forest to high-quality shortgrass prairie. Some of the sites here are right in the middle of town; some are breathtakingly remote. None of them will disappoint you.
Sites on this Trail
- River Bluffs Open Space
- CSU Environmental Learning Center
- Riverbend Ponds Natural Area
- Cottonwood Hollow Natural Area
- Fort Collins City Park/ Grandview Cemetery
- Pineridge Natural Area/Dixon Reservoir
- Horsetooth Reservoir
- Horsetooth Mountain Open Space
- Lory State Park
- Rist Canyon
- Watson Lake State Wildlife Area and Bellvue-Watson Fish Hatchery
- Reservoir Ridge Natural Area
- Poudre Trail – Ft. Collins Section
- Douglas Reservoir State Wildlife Area
- Wellington State Wildlife Area
- Hamilton Reservoir
- Soapstone Prairie Natural Area
- Lower Poudre Canyon/Gateway Natural Area
- Laramie River Road
- Cameron Pass and upper Poudre Canyon