With very little open water, only the Dupont lagoon, the ferry channels to Wolfe and Amherst Islands and variable amounts off the south shore of Amherst, waterfowl are quite concentrated and appearing in surprisingly good numbers. On Monday a flock of about 50 Greater Scaup were off Amherst, certainly migrants and a welcome alternative to the hundreds of Common Goldeneye that have predominated all winter. Tuesday, a group had 13 species of waterfowl on Amherst including both Tundra and Mute Swans, however the numbers fluctuate with high counts of 3 Tundra on Feb. 25th and 7 Mute on Feb. 27th. One of the best birds of the week was a Greater White-fronted Goose with a few Canadas in the ferry channel near Stella last Sunday. It didn't linger. There are still lots of hawks on both islands and each of the islands reported 2 Snowy Owls this week. Two Short-eared Owls and a Great Horned on a nest were seen on Wolfe on Wednesday but a group from New York State that same day had "dozens" of Short-eared on Amherst in the late afternoon. Two groups have failed to turn up any Long-eared Owls in the Owl Woods this week; they must have dispersed because there is obviously lots of food on the island. Flocks of Snow Buntings are on both islands and there has been a noticeable increase in the number of Horned Larks; there were 31 on the Palace Rd. near Newburg showing a significant movement inland. Robins are appearing more regularly; 20 on Amherst Tuesday, a couple of small flocks on Wolfe on Wednesday and 4 on the Gore Rd. yesterday. The trip to Wolfe on Wednesday also yielded a single Song Sparrow. The other best bird of the week was a Townsend's Solitaire found Tuesday by a pair of Kingston birders who had gone to Prince Edward County to get the Harris's Sparrow (see Terry Sprague's report) and drove out to Prince Edward Point afterwards to check on waterfowl. They noticed an "odd robin" amidst the hundreds of regular Robins about a kilometre east of the Little Bluffs Conservation Area, managed to get a couple of reasonable photographs and then watched it disappear into the wild blue yonder. Cheers, Peter Good Kingston Field Naturalists 613 378-6605
