Hi all,
By 0830hrs. 14 vehicles had gathered at GB Sobey's seeing a Kestrel
here. By car pooling 12 headed to the beach for a quite cool start to the day,
seeing 3 sp. of Merganser, Ruddy Duck, Surf Scoter, Horned Grebe, Red-throated
Loon, D.C. Cormorant and 3 gull sp. Our second stop at GB lagoons was quite
productive with lots of waterfowl variety plus Golden-crowned Kinglet, Am Tree
and Song Sparrow, Red-winged and Rusty Blackbird, Am. Pipit, Killdeer, Pectoral
Sandpiper, Dunlin and Gr. Yellowlegs and 4 Sandhill Crane as we returned to the
cars and 1 family with obligations excused themselves from the group.
We drove to the Pinery via Mollard, Greenway, Cold Storage, Goosemarsh
to the Museum parking lot to leave 2 cars whilst in the park. En route we saw
Rough-legged and Red-tailed Hawk, Horned Lark, E. Bluebird, N. Harrier,
Dark-eyed Junco, Blue Jay. We ate lunch at the pic-nic tables and saw Cedar
Waxwing, Am. Robin and Cardinal here as well as a very fresh Red Admiral as the
sun had raised the temperature. On the way to Burley Bridge we saw more
E.Bluebird, Downy Woodpecker but the Bald Eagles were not to be seen and
another family left us here.
The VC feeders produced several Tufted Titmouse, 1 Fox Sparrow, a
female E.Towhee and the usual chickadees and juncos. At Beach Parking #9 the
water was quite bumpy making it difficult to identify some fairly distant ducks
and we opted to go to the Heritage trail to seek the Red-headed Woodpecker
family - we probably saw all 4 birds albeit 2 at a time as well as 2 Golden
Eagle flying high over the old Ausable channel.
After retrieving 2 vehicles at the museum we headed to Kettle Point
via Army Camp, driving unto the beach at West Ipperwash. We found all 3 Scoter
sp., several Common Loon, lots of Horned Grebe and more. At the main point we
added 2 juvenile Bald Eagle, 3 adult Great Black-backed Gull, Mute Swan, 6/7
Black-bellied Plover and close to 300 Dunlin(until a dog spooked them) - but
this made for some spectacular flights. A light morph Parasitic Jaeger was a
fabulous close to a lovely day of birding with some very kind and co-operative
people. The total count for the day was 77 species
It was a great pleasure for me to lead this OFO trip and I thank all
the participants - cheers! Maris
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Send bird reports to birdalert@ontbirds.ca
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