Hello,
I just got back from birding Amherst Island for the last two days. The warblers migration is going strong, I was able to identify 17 species of birds, along with vireos and flycatchers in a steady and sometime very heavy flow. The birds were moving through the south west corner of the island. A couple of interesting notes. The movement was a fairly heavy flow each morning until noon, when a south-west wind would start across the lake and each day the flow would abruptly stop. The most abundant warblers in the movement was the Wilson's, Orange-crowned, Magnolia and the American Redstart. I witness a couple of unusual confrontation, one was a run-in with a Merlin and a Belted Kingfisher, as you might suspect, at one point the Kingfisher dove into the water to avoid the Merlin, which it did, then it actually swam on the surface of water very similar to a waterfowl and took flight when it felt the sky was clear. Another was when I was birding for owls late in the day and after sunset but not total darkness, I came across a Red-tailed Hawk which had just killed a rabbit. This was a strange sight to see in the head lights, the bird tried to fly away with its prey, but was unable to get airborne, so it just stood by and guarded its catch. If ever you birders wished to stay on the Island over-night, I highly recommend staying at the Bed and Breakfast called "Popular Dell". Fantastic place. Direction: Amherst is approx. 30 min west of Kingston and can be reached off of the Loyalist Parkway by ferry. Leaves the main land on the i/2 hour and the island on the hour during regular work hours. Cheers, Brian www.birds-of-north-america.net _______________________________________________ ONTBIRDS is presented by the Ontario Field Ornithologists - the provincial birding organization. Send bird reports to ONTBIRDS mailing list [email protected] For information about ONTBIRDS visit http://www.ofo.ca/
