An unusual bird-watching festival in Colorado has been set for the weekend starting April 28. If you’re unfamiliar with the event on the state’s eastern plains, you’ll want the time to consider attending and planning.

Organizers around Karvel call it the Mountain Plover Festival. But it’s “not the kind (of festival) you are thinking of,” a recent announcement read.

The oddities begin with the main attraction. The “mountain” in the name comes from the plover’s migration over the Rockies from California. But on the contrary, mountain plovers prefer Colorado’s short-grass prairie. Starting in 2001, a researcher put the fallow fields surrounding Karvel on the map for seekers of the notoriously elusive species.

“This bird is called the ghost of the prairie,” the festival announcement read, “so you have to hunt for them.” Do not expect grand outflights as you see from snow geese, for example.

The announcement went on: “Do not just arrive the day of.” Show up after the buses leave the community building for morning and afternoon tours, “and you will feel like you are in a ghost town.”

Visitors need to account for Karval having no gas stations, hotels or restaurants. Hence why reservations are required — organizers arrange meals and overnights on private ranches. Some attendees bring RVs, others bring tents.

Another option is to book a hotel in Limon or Hugo, offered a Q&A attached to the announcement. You’ll want to fill up the gas tank in those towns, the Q&A added, recognizing perhaps the obvious question:

“Why on earth do people want to attend?”

The answer: “Because this is one of the coolest things you might ever experience in Colorado.”

Along with the mountain plovers, organizers take pride in the area’s “unbelievably dark skies with lots and lots of stars.” And along with the birds, central to the idea of the festival 15 years ago was the idea of an authentic, western experience.

Third-generation ranchers, descendants of homesteaders, lead the tours on public and private lands, speaking on the birds, conservation strategies and local history. The area is the site of the old Goodnight-Loving Trail, on which cowboys drove Texas longhorn cattle through Colorado in the 1860s.

The ranchers also provide entertainment and homestyle food. The chuck wagon dinner is the Saturday night of the three-day affair.

Individual tickets for one day start at $50. For more information, go to mountainploverfestival.com