Some Recent Sightings

The Avon River has been a great place for gulls over the last couple weeks.  Among the usual species, iceland, thayers, glaucous and great black backed gulls have been recently observed.

When I heard that the great black backed gulls were around today, I decided to check them out.  Arriving at the big cluster of gulls, it was easy to quickly pick out a couple great black-backed.

They were pretty easy to distinguish from the surrounding herring gulls.

I came across a hen pintail further down the river associating with the mallards.  It came up as a rare species on eBird, but with this mild weather it isn't a surprise that some species would be moving northward earlier than usual.

Among the mallards, it is quite easy to find many 'farm duck' crosses.  However today I found what appears to be a mallard-black duck cross, not something I often see.

Back home I found my first robin of the year the other day.  It's been an unusual winter so it probably didn't go far this winter.  It was a bit camera shy and wouldn't come out of the brush.

I'll end with a white-breasted nuthatch at the peanut feeder.

Stratford Scenes

I spent part of the afternoon today along the Avon River in Stratford.  Recent mild weather reopened the river which had been frozen not long before.  Both ducks and gulls have descended upon the open water.  The temperature was hovering around freezing, but there was little wind and I was anxious to put my new camera to the test.

My first sighting was this drone.  First time I've seen one used around here.  I scanned the area a bit, but could not see the operator.

Mallards were by far the most common duck on the river.

I was hoping for the long staying ring-necked duck or a couple hooded mergansers.  Both were present on the Christmas bird count, but they presumably moved on when things froze.]

There had been some interesting gulls reported lately and I scanned the large group halfway across the river.  I had just started picking through them when they all took off at once. 

I thought I had lost the opportunity to look through them, but the flock landed on a different portion of river and I came upon them again as I came down the trail.  Most were herring, but a juvenile glaucous gull near the edge stood out from the rest.  It was in no hurry to move and I got some good shots.

 I also found what appears to be an adult glaucous in the photo below. 

Juvenile centre left, adult center right.

The glaucous gull is a new species for me.  I don't usually have the patience to pick apart large flocks of gulls so it was great to find this species.

Towards the end of my walk I found a large group of mallards being fed.

Spring migrants are slowly starting to trickle back in.  It will be interesting to see what shows up in the upcoming weeks.

Playing With a New Camera

I finally decided to make a change.  After years of my simple point and shoot camera, I decided to upgrade to another point and shoot camera.

However this new camera is a big step for me.  I first heard about in on Nathan's Nature Adventure Blog.  He and Ontario Field Biology have both written about how much they enjoyed their sony 50hx camera with 30x optical zoom. 

For a long time I had been looking at DSLR cameras, but the price tag was out of my range at this point.  I have only just recieved this handy little point and shoot, but so far I am very impressed.  It is a size that will easily fit in my pocket when outdoors and I am very happy so far with the capabilities of the zoom.

I will  have more of an opinion on this camera as I get more used to it, but first impressions are good.  I'll conclude with some feeder shots taken with this camera.

american tree sparrow

pine siskins

black form grey squirrel

cardinals

dark-eyed junco

american goldfinch

Checking out Nest Boxes.

We have a variety of bird boxes in place over our farm and this is the time of year when I am usually out and about checking on them.  As natural cavities become less common, many species that depend on them do very well in man-made nest boxes.  The species we mainly target here on the farm are the wood ducks, eastern bluebirds, tree swallows and northern flickers.

Wood Ducks
 Many of the wood duck boxes are only accessible this time of year due to the frozen ponds so I take advantage of the cold weather to clean them out from last year and put in fresh shavings.

 The wood duck is probably the most commonly known  duck nest box user, but bufflehead, common goldeneye and hooded merganser will also make use of them.  Usually the wood duck is the only one nesting in our area of Ontario, but last year a batch of hooded mergansers was raised on one of our ponds.

Unusual species sometimes make themselves at home in the boxes and screech owls and squirrels are quite common.  It is more unusual to find a hibernating raccoon like I did in this box. This is also a sign that the box needs repairs.  

We have had many successful wood duck hatches over the years.  The photo below shows a duck nest with a mouse nest build overtop later.  This duck nest was successful as hatched shell fragments can be seen among the nest materials and were evident as I cleaned it out.

But with success, comes the occasional abandoned nest.

 I clean out last years nest material and replace with fresh shavings, not sawdust as it  could cause newly hatched ducklings to suffocate.

Notice the wear on the pieces under the hole made by years of ducklings using them to climb out.

Bluebirds and Tree Swallows
I also cleaned out other boxes I come across. 

Tree Swallow

The nest below is characteristic of a tree swallow, but bluebirds and chickadees have also been known to nest in the boxes.

Tree swallows use feathers found in the general area to build their nests, making them fairly easy to recognize.  

Tree swallow nest with egg.

Note the baby tree swallows in the middle of the mass of feathers

The empty nest.

I do not have any photos of bluebird nests as they are less frequent nesters on the farm.  However they do take up residence in a box from time to time and their nests of fine grasses are also quite easy to identify.

Northern Flicker

I have not yet observed flickers actually using the boxes, but flickers are residents here during the nesting season and so I am always hopeful. 

Bats

 It is not just the birds that can make use of a box.  This one was put up in the hopes of encouraging our local bat population.

Harris's Sparrow in Oxford County

Birders in southern Ontario may have heard about the long staying Harris's sparrow, just outside of Embro in Oxford county.  The bird was only a 25 minute drive from home for me and considering that it has been hanging around since November, I hoped to add it to my life list before it decided to move on.  Unfurtunately I did not pick the most pleasant day.  The car temperature read -11C on my way there and a recent snowstorm made the roads rather slick which slowed me down somewhat. 

Nevertheless I arrived at the property and immediately started scanning the birds.  In a phone call with the landowner that morning, he described where the sparrow was commonly being seen and I positioned myself in a corner of the yard where I could see the feeder and the ground underneath where plenty of juncos and american tree sparrows were hanging out. 

I did not see the sparrow right away, but decided to wait it out.  The usual yard species presented themselves and I added goldfinch, downy woodpecker, cardinal, mourning dove, blue jay, american crow (flyover), house sparrow and white-breasted nuthatch.  But there was no harris's sparrow to be seen. The wind chill did not make the cold temperatures any more pleasant.  I ended up returning to the vehicle for warmer gloves which made operating a scope more clumsy, but provided a bit more insulation.

40 minutes into the watch and I was considering leaving for home when an unusual sparrow landed on the ground.  I got on it with the scope and watched in picking around under and on the feeder.  I quickly pulled off my gloves and attempted a couple phone scoped shots for identification purposes.  They are pretty poor quality, but do confirm my sighting.

Seeing the bird made my frozen fingers worthwhile.  It was a great sighting and my first new bird on my life list for 2016.

Looking Back on the Stratford Area CBC

Last Monday I took part in my first Christmas Bird Count in the Stratford area.  I had never been part of a count before and so did not know exactly what to expect.  However I was hoping to meet some other local birders and hopefully see some species of interest.

The count was divided into seven zones and I met my fellow group members in a parking lot along the Avon River by 8:30.  We started our morning with a walk along the river where we picked up the usual geese, mallards and ring billed gulls.

The usual residents

  Things were looking up as we came across the long staying ring-necked duck.  I made reference to this bird in my previous post and it was great to add it to the count, definitely not a normal CBC bird.

Not far from the river, we caught a glimpse of a large bird circling over the trees, turkey vulture.  We would come across another large bunch later in the day bringing our count total to 14 vultures.  Based on past records, this is a first time they have been seen on the count.  Likely the mild weather has been a factor.

Surprisingly the common rock pigeon had eluded us all this while and we spent some time driving before picking up a flock.  That species seems to be all over when we aren't counting them.

We then walked through a residental area along the edge of Stratford and added most of the expected species at feeders along the way.

At noon, we stopped for a quick lunch at Tim Horton's and met the fourth member of our group.  Steve had been doing a solo walk along a rural section of the Avon.  We added his sightings to our list and then the group of us headed off for a drive along the rural sideroads of our zone.

We didn't pick up a lot of raptor variety, but managed northern harrier, and four rough-legged hawks.

Our last sighting of the day was horned lark and we headed back into town to regroup and put together our sightings.

Aside from our group's turkey vultures and ring-necked ducks, there were several other species of interest as well.  Notable gulls included a greater black-backed in St. Marys as well as two iceland and a thayers.   Cackling geese were also picked out at one location.

As in any count, we had some species that were higher than expected and some that were lower or not seen at all.   In general raptor numbers were lower, particularly red-tailed and coopers hawks.  No sharp-shinned this year.  No one managed to pick up any owls although a group had been out early in the morning trying.   However three great horned seen a day earlier managed to make count week.

Overall I really enjoyed my first CBC and hope to take part again next year.

Avon River Ramblings

Finally I'm putting out a blog post again.  I've been decently busy lately and haven't done as much birding as I would like. The forecast had predicted rain today, but fortunately it held off long enough for me to head into Stratford to the Avon River.  There was decent fog cover which made long range birding difficult, but it turned out to be an interesting day anyway.

The Avon has had several seasonal rarities lately and I was interested to see what I could find.  The mallards were certainly out in full force (no surprise) and I arrived as they were enjoying a late afternoon meal.

I headed off along the river and could soon see that the fog would present some challenges.

I was pretty sure photography would not be great, but attempted it anyway when the birds would let me close enough.

At one point I managed to pick out a female lesser scaup alone in the middle of the river.  She had also been reported on eBird this morning.  It wasn't a new species for me, but still great to see. 

I was scanning the canada geese when I noticed something odd.

In this zoomed in version of the above photo, I had my first good look at cackling geese.  Not much larger than nearby mallards and with their short stubby bills, it was a treat to see them and add them to my life list.

There were lots of eastern gray squirrel around both in black and gray morphs.

  A recent article in the local newspaper predicted a higher squirrel survival rate over this winter and into spring for much of southwestern Ontario.  The mild temperatures we have been having mean that they can harvest more nourishment for the winter and will go into the cold weather with more fat reserves.  If interested, the article can be found here.

In other Stratford birding news, a strange ring-necked duck has also been hanging around the river for most of the year.  It seems that he arrived with a group of ring-necks during spring migration and for some reason never left.  I caught a glimpse of him early last summer and according to the eBird updates I received, he stayed over summer and was reported again just yesterday although I did not see him today.   We are normally in their migration path but there isn't much reason why one should hang around this long.  It appears to be in good health.

As many of you probably know, we are approaching the time of year for Christmas Bird Counts.  I am looking forward to participating in my first count this year in the Stratford area.

That's all for now.