The North Bay Christmas Bird Count was held on December 14th. We had 15 field observers and four feeder watchers.
Weather was cold ranging from -19C to -24C, winds were moderate 16 km/h to 21 km/h. Snow depth was light from 5 to 10 cm. Cloudy with light snow in the afternoon. Not much open water, all the lakes covered and even the rivers were only partly open. Other than Mallards and American Black Ducks no other water birds. New for the count were Horned Larks and Chipping Sparrow. (Chipping Sparrow was reluctantly accepted a number of years ago, I didn't quite believe it) A new high was Bald Eagle with six seen. Five of those were seen at the East Ferris Dump. A high for the last eight years was Dark-eyed Junco with eight seen. Species with low numbers include Downy Woodpecker:9, American Crow: 28, Black-capped Chickadee: 150, Red-breasted Nuthatch: 5, White-breasted Nuthatch: 5, European Startling: 134. I suspect, but not confirmed, that Black-capped Chickadee may be at an all-time low for number seen per hour of effort for our count. Cheers, Brent _______________________________________________ ONTBIRDS is presented by the Ontario Field Ornithologists - the provincial birding organization. Send bird reports to [email protected] For information about ONTBIRDS including how to unsubscribe visit http://www.ofo.ca/site/page/view/information.ontbirdssetup
