Tuesday we took a walk on our local trail not expecting to see anything much and that was exactly what happened from a bird perspective. We did, unfortunately, end up witnessing a young woman attacked and bitten by a dog and had an ugly confrontation with the dog owner ourselves. We stayed with the young woman until she was picked up and then hung around until a bylaw officer came to take our statements. I realized later that I had Merlin running in my pocket so I ended up having most of the events roughly recorded on the app, something to keep in mind for other birders out there that might find themselves in an ugly situation. I also forgot to stop my ebird checklist until later that night so I had a 10 hour checklist going that I had to adjust back.
Wednesday was a rainy day and I stayed home trying in vain to loosen my pulled back and trying to book as much of our BC trip as possible because hotels are filling up fast in the popular vacation spots. Later, while I was talking to Marg on the phone Jerry shouted to me from the other end of the house that there was a Sharp-shinned Hawk in a tree so I grabbed bins and sure enough there was a tiny hawk trying to dry off at the top of a tree. I’ve been watching our feeders for weeks, like a hawk, for a Sharp-shinned Hawk and finally one had arrived. We pulled out the scope and had great views of its skinny pencil legs, its straight tail feathers and buggy eyes, all tell-tale signs that it was a Sharp-shinned instead of a Cooper’s Hawk. I am finally even with Jerry in the count again!
There has been a little bit of movement of birds as the weather warms. Red-winged Blackbirds, Grackles have arrived and Tundra Swans have started their migration. It is still early days but it will not be long until migration begins in earnest and we will be adding many more birds.
Thursday and Friday were taken up with appointments, the condo and household chores. Late Friday Jerry managed to finally have a sit in his fav chair with a view of the yard and just like the Sharp-shinned , he watched a hawk fly into the trees, he yelled to me and I got to the window in time to see a beautiful Red-shouldered Hawk fly over the pond, into the field back and forth and then finally into the large conifers behind the field. This is the 6th year in a row that a Red-shouldered Hawk has stopped in our yard. Some years we have seen it multiple times and days, other years we have only seen it once. We assume it is the same bird and this has become a winter stop or a stop on its migration path. Some years we see it in November/December and other years it has been January/February. This is the first time we have seen it in March. It will be nice if it sticks around but since we are rarely home we will probably not know if it does.
Saturday the weather was promising for a trip up to Algonquin Park to see about adding a few boreal species. The birding has not been good in Algonquin this winter because there are almost no cones on the conifers and no cones means no boreal species that eat them. But the birds we need have been seen occasionally and so we decided to take a chance and head north – at our usual 4:30am. We were in the park just after 8 and started towards the visitor centre. Most winters we would be seeing flocks of crossbills, redpolls, siskins eating grit on the roads but we drove the 35km without seeing a single flock and only seeing one Raven. Yikes, that was not good. The Visitor Centre has a few feeders that they keep stocked and most years you can stand out above the feeders and see almost all the boreal species but the only birds there were American Goldfinches, of which we have plenty at our own feeders. We did see a Creeper, Downy , Chickadees and Nuthatches in the trees but nothing that we needed for our list. Even the resident Ruffed Grouse was absent and we need a picture of a Ruffed Grouse for the year. We chatted with staff and renewed our seasonal pass and then headed over to Spruce Bog Trail. On the driveway out one bird was out picking up grit. A Red Crossbill! We heard this species out in BC but did not see it and obviously also need a picture.
When we got to the trail we fed some Chickadees and watched the Nuthatches but again, no boreal species, no Spruce Grouse, no Black-backed Woodpecker. It was a gorgeous day, bright blue sky, sunshine, white fluffy snow on the trees and being out on the trails kinda made up for the lack of birds. The trails were very narrow with packed down snow but one misstep off the path and you sunk up past your knee in snow. I know this because I did it a couple of times. Thankfully my sore back did not seize with the effort and we managed to hike 6 kms through the day at a few different trails.
Mid afternoon we decided to pack it in with one last stop at the Visitor Center but still nothing much around. The Crossbill ended up being the highlight of the day and the only bird that we added as seen and got a picture of and was added to our Ontario year list. Oh well! You cannot always expect everything to go your way when you bird and even though it seems like a “waste” of a day, neither of us felt that way at all. We loved being out on the trails, the weather was fantastic, we talked to nice people, we still saw birds and enjoyed watching them so it is never a waste of time birding.
Sunday with another sunny day forecast we headed to Niagara for our first attempt at a Black Vulture. This is the only place in Canada to reliably see them so this is one we absolutely need in Ontario. The bonus with Niagara is we could also look for Iceland Gull, Little Gull and Red-throated Loon. Of the four birds we were hopeful for we only saw one, a Little Gull. A bit disappointing but it is still forward movement and next week just may prove to be better as more warmer weather arrives.
Week 10 3 species added 167 species in Canada J&E