About 30 birders with 16 cars showed up at the Park Gate at 0800 hours. We went directly to the Rock Point Banding station where Jim Smith and Bev kindly showed us a number of interesting birds that had been trapped in the nets. Notable were: A young Canada Warbler, a young American Goldfinch, a Trail's Flycatcher, a Catbird, a young Common Yellowthroat and a Red-eyed Vireo. Some of the birders had a chance to handle and release the birds.
At 0900 hours Dan and Luc, who had been checking the Point, returned to tell us there were 6 species of shore birds there so we travelled to the washrooms at the south east end of the park and then and walked down to the point. All had good looks at the shorebirds (There was a little shore today!). They included: 4 Least Sandpipers, 6 Semi-palmated Sandpipers, 20 Semi-palmated Plovers, 5 Sandlerlings, 2 Killdeers and 3 Spotted Sandpipers. We drove to the sod farms. En route Mosaic Ponds, seen from the road, yielded two Wood Ducks but no shorebirds and no Common Egrets. It was not until we reached the dirt fields south of Poth Road that we had some target birds: 18 Black-bellied Plovers. Following Poth Road to the end and then traveling north we failed to find anything except Killdeers. At one stop we watched as 3 young Copper's Hawks were pursued by a group of crows. In a field north of Poth Road where two Bairds Sandpipers had been seen earlier in the morning we failed to find any birds as they had been chased away by a group flying model airplanes. Trip over at 1200 hours. John Black, with Dan Salisbury, Luc Fazio and Marcie Jacklin. _______________________________________________ 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 Posting guidelines can be found at http://www.ofo.ca/site/page/view/information.ontbirdsguide
