Are they only flying at night?

😀

a rather wealthy stalker person checking up on someone that lives in the area...

explains the grid search and the time of day.

but that is a crazy amount of money to spend on the effort. A private investigator would cost less.

anonymously - and we'd know the source. I'm not a fan of private companies getting
waivers to fly heavy drones over private property. Really, someone in CO needs to
grow a pair. Fed crime - blah-blah-blah fuckity blah.

I saw the protestors in Hong Kong doing this too. Toy lasers can bring down drones and disable Face Recognition cameras.

https://interestingengineering.com/chilean-protesters-used-lasers-to-bring-down-police-drone-and-it-worked

Or as the article said, perhaps mapping the area.

Years ago I met a rancher once who flew his own small plane from his home in Yuma County to visit his daughter who lived in the tulies south of Rifle. I can't imagine that the airspace would be safe for pilots like him if they have to share it with these drones.

Ufos