Quick update since I’m rather sleep deprived right now…
On Sunday morning I left home at 5am and drove down to Long Point, where I met up with Ezra for a day of birding. Besides common yearbirds, the main target was Eurasian Wigeon. Euro wigeons are annual but rare in southern Ontario, with a few showing up each spring around the Rondeau/Long Point area. Typically they show up from mid March through late April, and since other migrant dabbling ducks were beginning to show up in the province it seemed like a good time to search for them. Of course you can’t really count on finding one, but March is traditionally a poor month for rarities so I felt like it was a good use of time.
When I arrived at Long Point with Ezra, it quickly became apparent that it would not be a warm, spring like day. It was snowing as I left the Bruce, and the roads were mostly covered on the way down, but this didn’t stop me from hoping the weather would someone magically change as I got closer to my destination. The wind out of the northwest was strong and biting, and coupled with light snow showers it made scanning for waterfowl quite uncomfortable.
We spent the morning looking for open water, driving from Port Rowan out to the provincial park on Long Point. The cold snap over the weekend had frozen the majority of the water, including a good chunk of the marsh along the causeway and a most of the other normally productive spots. We did find some birds though, including thousands of Redheads, Canvasbacks and scaup and smaller numbers of Tundra Swans, Sandhill Cranes and Northern Pintail. No Eurasian Wigeons showed themselves, but we did see around 70 Americans. A Pied-billed Grebe was the only yearbird I came across. After a few hours we decided to work our way back towards Hamilton, stopping along the way at Silver Lake in Port Dover. There we encountered a large flock of Canada Geese, with 4 Cackling Geese hidden among them.
In the afternoon the conditions continued to deteriorate, so we headed along the east shore of Lake Ontario in search of Fish Crows. A few had been reported around Halton/Peel Counties in the past few weeks, so we decided since we weren’t doing much it was a good time to go & get it out of the way. Not too long ago Fish Crows were rare in the province, but in the last decade they’ve increased in numbers and are now found regularly in a few spots around the western edge of Lake Ontario. They are still far from common though, most of the time seeing one requires travelling to one of the locations where they frequent. After dipping at the spot in Halton, we continued into Peel County and spent some time looking for crows around Lakefront Promenade Park. An hours search turned up a few American Crows, but nothing else.
At this point it was getting getting late in the day, so we began heading back towards Hamilton. On the way we stopped again in Halton at Sioux Lookout park ~ the same spot we had tried a few hours previously. This time almost immediately after arriving we spotted a flock of crows beside the road. Something seemed fishy (sorry), so we pulled over to have a look. Right away they started calling, the classic “UH-UH” call of a fish crow. We counted 8 in total, a good count for this part of Ontario and the most seen this year for sure. Mission accomplished we called it quits for the day…
Visually Fish Crows look basically identical to an American Crow, so here’s one of the recordings I took of them. https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/425333191
Why no photos? Well honestly it was cold and snowy and nothing really lured me to take pictures. Just imagine a cold, snowy day spent birding beside the lake.
Today (yesterday when this goes out) I headed down to Rondeau/Pelee area with Ezra, again in search of migrants and euro wigeon. The temperature overnight had unfortunately frozen almost all of the remaining open water, so that threw a wrench in our plans. Most of the good spots I had visited last weekend, when they were filled with water and ducks, were now iced over. After an uneventful few hours around Pelee, we headed back towards Rondeau to check the bay there. Luckily there was open water there, however most of the ducks were distant and backlit, making viewing conditions horrible. There were American Wigeon, Green-winged Teal and Wood Ducks around, but nothing too noteworthy. I spent a bit of time walking the streets of Shrewsbury in search of that damn Eurasian Collare-Dove that eluded me last weekend. Long story short, the dove remained missing in action, but I did find a Ruby-crowned Kinglet, a good bird for this time of year and also my first of 2022.
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| - Rondeau Bay |
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| - Ruby-crowned Kinglet |
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| - Assortment of ducks |
After coming up empty at a few other spots, we headed back to Hamilton, where a possible Pacific Loon had been reported. In the end it turned out to be a Red-throated Loon, but it had turned out to be a really nice day so it was fun birding the Hamilton lakeshore. We ended up coming across two Red-throated Loons (yearbird), as well as a Common Loon and a plethora of diving ducks. The loons were very far out, so I only managed a poor photo through the scope. Red-throated Loon was my 300th photographed species in Ontario… kinda cool.
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| - a horrible, horrible photo of a Red-throated Loon |
We then checked Cootes Paradise (frozen), before heading back to the Campanelli house for dinner. In the evening we headed over to McMaster Forest, where we enjoying watching several American Woodcocks perform their display flights overhead. Not a bad way to end the day!
Tomorrow I’m going to Niagara with Ezra, in hopes of seeing a Black Vulture fly over the river into Ontario…
Ontario Yearlist @ March 14th - 157
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