The 75th Kingston CBC was held on Sunday, December 18. The count circle covers the entire west end of Wolfe Island and all of Kingston from Collins Bay in the west to the tip of Howe Island in the east; it extends north above the 401 to include the Little Cataraqui Creek Conservation Area and Kingston Mills.
The weather on count day was mild: primarily sunny with clouds, temperatures at or just below zero and light winds. There were light flurries in the morning in some areas, about 10 cm of snow cover, the small inland bodies of water were mostly frozen and the main lake was open and fairly calm. We had 62 participants in the field and 97 feeder watchers who together did over 350 hours of birding. A total of 84 species was tallied on count day with 5 additional count week species; there were no new species recorded. This is below the 20 year average of 96 species but roughly on par with results over the past 5 years… Could this be the “new normal”? Feeder watchers added 3 species to the total that weren’t seen in the field: Purple Finch, Pine Siskin and Common Redpoll. As predicted by this year’s finch forecast, this was not an irruption year. There were 35,664 individual birds tallied, 75% of the previous 20 year average. Notable finds included: Baltimore Oriole (the 2nd since 1988), Black Scoter, Horned Grebe, Northern Pintail, Green-winged Teal, Northern Saw-whet Owl, Tufted Titmouse, Brown Thrasher, Northern Mockingbird, Carolina Wren, Common Grackle, Red-winged Blackbird. THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO MADE THIS YEAR'S COUNT A SUCCESS! Kathy Webb Kingston CBC Compiler -- Ontbirds and Birdnews are moderated email Listservs provided by the Ontario Field Ornithologists (OFO) as a service to all birders in Ontario. Birdnews is reserved for announcements, location summaries, first of year reports, etc. To post a message on Birdnews, send an email to: [email protected]. If you have any questions or concerns, contact the Birdnews Moderators by email at [email protected]. Please review posting rules and guidelines at http://ofo.ca/site/content/listserv-guidelines During the COVID-19 pandemic, all Ontario birders should be taking extra precautions and following local, provincial, and federal regulations regarding physical distancing and non-essential travel. To find out more about OFO, please visit our website at ofo.ca or Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/OntarioFieldOrnithologists.
