Chronicles of an Ontario Birder: the fourth was with me (on the eBird big day)

the fourth was with me (on the eBird big day)

The eBird Global Big Day fell on the 4th of May this year, so I headed out at 5am with a goal to get 100 species. I decided to make it a bike big day, as my parents weren't too keen about waking up early on a weekend to drive me around (odd isn't it?🤔).
My first birds of the day were a singing Wood Thrush and an American Woodcock in my yard.
I then headed over to Sky Lake, picking up Brewer's Blackbird, Eastern Bluebird and Northern Waterthrush on the way.

- Brewer's Blackbird

At Sky Lake I picked up a few good birds, including Common Loon and Brown Thrasher. While I was scanning the lake four Nothern River Otters popped up right in front of me, which was awsome. I rarely see otters in my area, so this was a nice treat.

- Northern River Otter

- Otter of the northern rivers

Just as I was about to get on my bike a Snowshoe Hare jumped out of the forest in front of me, obviously in cahoots with the otters to distract me from birding😒. Hares are pretty common up here, but it's always nice when one sits still for a picture.

- Snowshoe Hare

I then biked down to the Oliphant coast, where I got Osprey and Caspian Tern for the list. The fourth seemed to be with me, as I ran into a friend who was also doing a big day (and had a car, score!). He said that I could come with him for the day, so I hopped in and we headed off to rack up our species lists. We stopped at Sauble Beach briefly on our way, as there are often good birds there. While at the beach we picked up North Rough-winged Swallow, Common Goldeneye and Horned Grebe, but somehow missed Piping Plover (the horror!😱).

- Northern Rough-winged Swallow

The next stop was the J/I line by Port Elgin, where we hoped to pick up some grassland birds. It turned out to be a good decision, as we saw Bobolink, American Kestrel, Vesper Sparrow and a lone Black-bellied Plover.

- Bobolinks

- Vesper Sparrow

After the J/I we hit the Kincardine Harbour and the Kincardine Sewage Lagoons, where we got Surf Scoter, Ruddy Duck and Cape May Warbler.

- Surf Scoters

- Cape May Warbler

We then headed up to the Grey/Bruce line, where we added Blue-winged Teal, Gadwall and Northern Pintail to the list.

We finished our joint big day at 5pm in Hepworth, leaving my total at 99 species.
In the evening I went to Isaac Lake, where I picked up Sora and American Bittern.

- Blue-winged Teal

- Sora

Those were the last additions to my list, leaving me at 101 species. It was a great day to be outside and I was really happy with how the day went.

I have been getting up early every morning for the last week, as the birding is always better in the first few hours of the day. I get a lot of songbirds flying over my house most morning (with the most movement happening in the first hour after sunrise), the highlights so far have been Eastern Kingbirds, Great Creasted Flycatchers, over 300 warblers of 9 warbler species (90% Palm Warbler and Yellow-rumped Warbler), Rusty Blackbirds and Bobolinks.
I had an awesome morning on May 5th, when I saw 91 species in my neighbourhood in under 2 hours. Highlights were 19 warbler species, Blue-grey Gnatcatcher, Philadelphia Vireo, Least Flycatcher, Baltimore Oriole, and Indigo Bunting. The lighting was pretty bad when I was out, but I managed to get a few pictures.