Just, wow... That's all I have to say. Since leaving home last Monday to chase the Barnacle Goose in Ottawa, I have been all around the province birding and chasing rarities. It has been a very successful week and I have added 21 birds since my last update, including 5 rarities. All this running around has left little time for blogging though, so I have fallen a bit behind. As such, here's a recap;
- April 12th
After returning from Ottawa the previous night and returning to Ezra's place, I tried to decide what to do the following day. The winds were out of the southeast and it called to be decently warm and sunny... Which combined meant one thing to me, go birding at The Bluff. The 5:00am wakeup wasn't that enjoyable, but a few minutes later I was on the road with Ezra asleep in the passenger seat. It was a chilly start to the day at The Bluff, but soon after sunrise things started warming up and the birds started moving. It soon became clear that flickers would be the dominant species of the morning, as there was almost constant movement, with up to 5 or 10 being in view at once. A Tufted Titmouse flew in and landed right in front of us at one point, where it caught a Wooly Bear caterpillar before moving on. This was a new species for my Bluff list and a fun morning flight bird. By 9am the flicker flight was really starting to heat up, and a few raptors were hinting at the possibility of a good hawkwatch day. Then a message came in on the Discord rare bird alert... Black-necked Stilt in London. Needless to say we were immediately on the road heading towards Komoka Conservation Area, which conveniently was less than an hour away. I will not lie, I was rather disappointed to leave just when things were getting good, but that's just what one has to do on a big year.
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| - Northern Flicker |
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| - Flick |
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| - another |
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| - Tufted Titmouse |
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| - Tufter Titmouse with a wooly bear! |
We arrived at the stilt stakeout just after 10:00am and discovered a small crowd of birders were already there. The Black-necked Stilt was still there as well, much to my relief. There has been at least one or two a spring for the past few years in Ontario, but it's a nice one to get out of the way early. The bird was moving around constantly while we were there, seeming very restless as it flew from one side of the pond to the other. It wasn't seen again after mid afternoon, so we were lucky to see it when we did.
The plan was to make it to Point Pelee that evening, where we wanted to bird the following day. Since it was still the morning though, we had a bit of time to kill getting there. We thought about what to do for a bit, eventually making the decision to drive down to the coast of Haldimand County and then bird our way west along the lake. This area has hosted many rare birds in the past and rare gulls and herons were on my radar. the drive along the shore of Haldimand was fairly quiet overall, save for a Common Loon, numerous Bonaparte's Gulls and my first Barn Swallow of the year. Before we moved on towards Norfolk, we swung by Townsend Sewage Lagoons for a quick check. This turned out to be a good idea, as we saw a Long-billed Dowitcher there, another yearbird for the day and a slightly early arrival.
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| - Long-billed Dowitcher |
After that we drove to the beach at Turkey Point, where in the fading light we scanned the shoreline for shorebirds and gulls. Several Forster's Terns were present, yet another yearbird for the day. There was also another Little Gull hanging out with a flock of bonnies.
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| - Little (left) and Bonaparte's Gulls |
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| - Forster's Tern |
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| - FOTE |
Litlle Gull photo-op....
That was basically it for the birding, as the rest of the day was spent driving down to Point Pelee... where we car camped in an undisclosed location for the night. A Henslow's Sparrow was found at Pelee in the evening, but unfortunately it was right before sunset and at that point we were still 2 hours away...
- April 13th
Awake just after 6:00am and in Point Pelee before dawn. If the Henslow's Sparrow wasn't seen the previous night I would have gone straight to the tip, but we decided to give it a thorough search first just in case. For around an hour we walked around West Beach looking, but in the end we came up sparrowless. Several Field Sparrows kept flushing out of the grass and scaring the sh*t out of me...
A Palm Warbler flew up from beside the path too, first yearbird of the day.
I then made my way to the tip, where several other birders were already standing and watching the reverse migration. I must say, something about that morning just felt exciting, like the next bird that went by could be a rarity. For mid April the reverse was quite good, with large flocks of Chipping Sparrows and blackbirds being the dominant species. Some highlights were; 2 Eastern Meadowlarks, 4 Vesper Sparrows, 2 Northern Rough-winged Swallows (FOY) White-throated Sparrows (weird to see up in the air), over a dozen Yellow-rumped Warblers and a few Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers.
The remainder of the day was spent walking around the park, covering a good chunk of the trails. It rained on and off, but for the most part it was a nice day to be out birding. It was the first time this year that I've been somewhere and seen migrants everywhere... Pretty exciting to be getting close to the good season at Pelee! Some highlights included;
- Northern Mockingbird at the tip, then another at Sparrow Field. Pretty cool to have two in a day, as mockingbird is a good bird at Pelee
- an early migrant Grasshopper Sparrow found at the tip, the first one in Ontario this year...
- 3 House Wrens (a tad early. Tripped the filter on eBird)
- 1 Wood Thrush, which I think was the first for Ontario this year
- A total of 25 Field Sparrows and 6 Vesper Sparrows
- Louisiana Waterthrush
5 yearbirds at the park, not too shabby...
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| - Wood Thrush |
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| - Brown Thrasher |
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| - Louisiana Waterthrush |
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| - LOWA |
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| - Field Sparrow |
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| - Chipping Sparrows |
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| - Vesper Sparrow |
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| - Grasshopper Sparrow |
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| - Northern Mockingbird |
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| - Eastern Meadowlark |
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| - Vesper Sparrow |
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| - Chipping Sparrows reversing |
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| - More chippers |
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| - Yellow-rumped Warbler |
In the afternoon Ezra and I visited Hillman Marsh, where we found a nice flock of shorebirds, including 3 yearbirds. The Haul; 81 Dunlin, 1 Pectoral Sandpiper and 2 Black-bellied Plovers. Kind of weird getting black-bellied before american-golden. A Purple Martin also flew over, yearbird #199
- April 14th
The conditions weren't meant to be that favourable for Pelee birding, so after checking Hillman in the morning (nothing besides Black-bellied Plover) we headed east along the shore of Lake Erie. The previous evening two rare birds had been found, both with larks in their name. The first was a Lark Bunting, which had been photographed on the faraway land of Amherst Island in eastern Ontario, and the 2nd was a Lark Sparrow that was seen at Long Point. My hopes weren't high that either would be refound, but if headed east we would be poised better to chase them should they be refound.
Birding along the lake in the morning was COLD and WINDY, making birding out in the open rather unenjoyable. We checked a few different lagoons and ponds... but it was pretty dead. One highlight was yearbird Spotted Sandpiper at Blenheim Sewage Lagoons, my 200th bird of the year. Around 11:00am I got a call from William Konze, who told us the Lark Sparrow had been refound at Long Point. For some reason I have it in my head that Rondeau is closer to Long Point than it actually is, when in reality it is close to two hours... an annoying distance when you're chasing a bird.
We arrived after 1pm and began scouring the neighborhood around Old Cut along with William, who had arrived just before us. I have never been a fan of these chases... slowly walking around town streets and peering into peoples backyards. It makes me uncomfortable, especially when I have my binoculars up looking at birds, then the homeowner walks through my field of view and there's that moment of awkward eye contact. Of course I explain that I'm a birder and not some creep, and for the most part I think people believe me. After nearly two hours of walking around the area I was getting a bit annoyed. I've seen a few Lark Sparrows before in Bruce, but these birds were reliably coming to a single feeder and thus were a lot easier to track down. Then, William calls me, he is looking at the bird. I see him in the distance and do my best Tom Cruise impression as I bolted down the road. With my binoculars swinging and my camera clunking in my backpack. I am convinced I looked equally cool. The sparrow was still hopping around the yard when I arrived, and I enjoyed watching it for a few minutes before it was spooked and disappeared down the street. Lark Sparrow is a code 3 bird and is usually seen in southern Ontario a few times every year, so it's a nice one to get out of the way early.
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| - Lark Sparrow |
After that we birded the causeway on the way out, but didn't see much besides Forster's Terns. We then joined William and birded Turkey Point for a bit, where we found a massive flock of swallows that were out foraging over the lake. Mixed in with a few hundred Tree Swallows were Barn, Northern Rough-winged and Bank Swallows (bank was a yearbird)... not a bad haul.
The forecast for the weekend wasn't too promising, so my parents picked me up in Waterloo (my car is still in the shop, thanks mom and dad!) and I headed back to Bruce.
- April 16
Caught up on some stuff around home and napped all day....
A Snowy Egret was found by Markham...
- April 17
In the morning I headed south to chase the Snowy Egret. Snowy is a code 3 bird, and while a few show up every spring/summer and I'm worried about missing it, chasing it seemed like a smart decision. My mom decided to come down with me, even though that she knows getting in the car with a big year birder is always risky. Around an hour into the trip a new report comes in... Yellow-throated Warbler in Guelph. This is a slightly better bird than Snowy Egret, so we rerouted and headed to Guelph. The warbler was seen initially at 8am, but despite birders looking for a few hours after that it hadn't been refound. Then, literally 1 minute before I arrived it was refound. After parking I abandoned mom and raced up the path, where I found a crowd of birders gathered around a stand of shrubs. In the shrubs was a warbler with a bright yellow throat, a black triangular marking around its eye and a grayish back... It was of course a Northern Cardinal (joke). Yellow-throated Warbler was also a lifer for me, an overdue one for Ontario. I like it when things work out like this, nice and easy... I let other birders do all the work, then just walk up and get the bird. There were a number of birders there... Andy Nguyen, Isabel Apkarian, Dana Latour, Luke Raso and some other random folks whose names I don't know/forget.
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| - Yellow-throated Warbler |
At this point I got news of a Eurasian Tree Sparrow that had been found in Long Point by Brett Fried, in the same yard that I had seen the Lark Sparrow in a few days before. Slightly annoying : )
I informed mom that we would now be "detouring" to Long Point, which she took surprisingly well. Eurasian Tree Sparrow is an OBRC rarity and isn't seen in southern Ontario every year, so I really wanted to get it. Some days these Long Point birds are only seen one day, so getting it on the day it's first seen is the smart play. After arriving at Bluebill Ave in Long Point, I joined the crowd of birders who were standing in front of a yard with an array of scope and cameras. The Lark Sparrow came out almost immediately... of course. The Eurasian Tree Sparrow on the other hand refused to show itself. An hour passed, then another hour. I walked the block twice but came up empty. On my second loop around the block I came back to the stakeout to discover it was void of birders and cars... including my moms car. I checked my phone and saw that the tree sparrow had been refound at the feeders of the Old Cut Bird Observatory just down the road. Mom assumed I was already there so she just drove over. Doh! Another Tom Cruise running scene followed and I arrived at Old Cut a minute later. Ezra, William and the rest of the birders were all there and had just seen the bird, but it had literally just disappeared. I waited for 15 minutes before the bird eventually flew out again, where it landed for a minute before being flushed back into the brush. Phew! This was another lifer for me, and a sweet addition for the big year.
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| - Eurasian Tree Sparrow |
Oh yeah remember that Lark Bunting on Amherst Island? It had been seen on April 16th and again on the 17th... It was too late to go by that point, and also I don't think my mom would consider Amherst on the way home. I made plans to go with a few other birders the following day and headed back to Bruce with 2 new rarities on my list. Not a bad day.
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