February Birding - Redpolls, Snow Buntings & Rough Legged Hawks

 

This February has been a pretty good month for birding in Windsor -Essex. Probably the best highlight has been a small influx of Common Redpolls that I have seen in a few different spots in the city and county!

Snow buntings and Lapland Longspurs are pretty common in the depths of winter - but are always fun to see. 

In this past month, I've had some great looks at Kestrels, Merlins and Rough legged Hawks. I have seen a Merlin near ADM / Black Oak Heritage Park (Windsor West End) almost daily for the last week. I have never been able to see one so consistently in the decade or so that I have been bird watching. 

Just this weekend, I was driving near Harrow, and a Dark Morph Rough Legged Hawk gave generous looks and it looped right over the road I was driving on.  I got tonnes of photos as the bird flew overhead. Sunshine and blue sky along gave for great photography of this bird. And amazingly, the snow-covered fields provided for some lighting from underneath giving the photos an almost HDR effect. As the Rough legged Hawk soared through the sky, I had noticed that the bird almost eclipsed the moon, which was out on Saturday afternoon--- and --- full disclosure --- I figured I might try to see if I could transpose the bird next to the moon ... how did it turn out?

 

The most amazing bird in this month is one I had seem a few weeks ago - a Virginia Rail that (perhaps?) attempted to overwinter in the county.  It has most definitely moved on to a warmer area south of here but ... it was pretty cool to see this bird in early February. 

Warwick Gyrfalcon & Merlin

Warwick Gyrfalcon

Blake's blog recently featured an excellent lingering rarity - the Warwick Gyrfalcon! As the work-week ended - I talked to Rick and Jeremy H about carpooling to see this bird and joined up with Jerermy H with high hopes of seeing this bird. I wanted to carpool to reduce my carbon footprint and also to have more eyes on the bird - not to mention good company. Soon after arriving in the prescribed area, we caught sight of this fantastic arctic beauty.  A life bird for Jeremy and myself!

Even though this photos are not too good, I had soul-satisfying views of this bird through Jeremy's scope. It soon flew off and even watching fly away was nice. Its a great bird!


An alternative post title was going to be: Gyr, Mer, Brr, & Jer!!!

Just as the Gyrfalcon flew off, a Merlin flew in for some nice looks though our scope.

Gyr, Jer and I spent some time looking for other good birds in the area such as Snowy Owl and Northern Shrike but were content to return home. Snow Buntings, Northern Harriers and Red tailed Hawks were abundant along the roadways. It has been a while since I've seen Snow Buntings so it was nice to see them. Did you know that the "all about birds" main photo for Snow Buntings is one of mine? See it here: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Snow_Bunting/id .

Good Birding!
Dwayne

Recent Life List Additions:

Mississippi Kite 394
Grey Flycatcher 395
Sabine's Gull 396

Gyrfalcon 397

Seasonal November Birding Observations

Lapland Longspur

Rusty Blackbirds

I've had mediocre birding observations over the last few weeks. I haven't had as much time to bird as I'm taking night school courses at the U of Windsor along with full time work and parenting duties. I've had two or three major highlights though - I had my first Common Redpoll in Essex County yesterday at Point Pelee. Common Redpolls are a great bird for me. I've only seen them on a few rare occasions at Rondeau, never in Essex County.  A female Purple finch, as well as some seasonal raptors were seen at Point Pelee. I also had a Richard C. sighting aka LLB.

I think the photo above is a Franklin's Gull - I could be wrong- (let me down gently if I am).  I photographed it at Wheatley Harbour flying Southwest towards Hike Metal products (Essex Co). I'm quite certain I saw Franklin's Gulls in Calgary Alberta a few summers ago, so this is not a life bird, but its a first for Ontario and now a Chatham-Kent and Essex bird. It was exciting to read about these birds from Allen and Blakes' blogs over the last few days. Hopefully some stick around for more closer observation and study.

Closer to home, I've had some cool nature sightings just from my back porch. I've seen a Fox Sparrow briefly every weekend for the last three or four weeks, but when I grab my camera, its gone! But today, I finally saw this sparrow foraging along my fence line and had my camera close. Along with seeing a Fox Sparrow this morning I had 2-3 Eastern Bluebirds - ***mind blown*** perched on a tree in my back yard! Last weekend, I had an American Kestrel perched in my back yard as well. As I was looking at the bluebirds (couldn't get more than a diagnostic photo) and Fox Sparrow, a male deer walked by- pretty cool! I've also had Coyotes howling and barking after sunset last week, which is kind of scary. Red bellied Woodpeckers have been seen and heard with surprising regularity over the last few weeks as well.

Diagnostic Backyard Bluebird

I've had decent back-yard birds since I moved in this summer and fall migration season. I will need to compile a list of everything. I'm trying to keep an ongoing list with Ebird as well.

Good birding!
Dwayne

Clay coloured Nemisis Bird

Distant Western Grebe

With much effort this week, I stopped by the Pelee area after work to try to get some birding in between work and dinner. I did get a brief glimpse of a Western Grebe, but not quite the "soul satisfying views" I had of one a while back at Sam Smith park near Toronto.

Lapland Longspur in breeding plumage!?!? Pretty Cool!

Smith's Longspur just didn't really happen for me this week but I did see some cool stuff instead. I saw a flock of 15 Black bellied Plovers, a Sharp shinned Hawk trying to kill some blackbirds, and a breeding plumage Lapland Longspur that started singing immediately after Tuesday's massive rain/hail/thunderstorm that interrupted my birding efforts.

This Water Snake was sunning itself on West Tip Pathway

Some other highlights from the week include Marbled Godwit & Willets at Hillman Marsh. A flock of 15 Black bellied Plovers and a nice close Purple Martin were nice to see tonight as well.

After spending some time around Hillman Marsh tonight, I found myself with 30 minutes left to bird at Pelee so I went for a brief walk along the Northwest Beach footpath. It is a path I rarely walk - I figured I would try something different, and something close to the front gate of the park. It was birdless but I did notice three little sparrows along the path and noticed one I had never seen before. Clay coloured Sparrow!

Field & Clay coloured Sparrows on Northwest Beach Footpath

I've been trying to find this bird for at least two spring migrations and could never seem to catch up to it until tonight. What a beautiful, distinctive Sparrow! A life bird!

Clay coloured Sparrow

Good birding!
Dwaynejava

LLS: Clay coloured Sparrow #345

New Year's Eve Birding & New Year's Greetings

Resident Bald Eagles at Pelee

Happy New Year!  I finally got a chance to get out to Point Pelee to do some birding over my Christmas break. I feel bad about not attending the local CBC's as ambitiously as I have in the past, but my health has been lackluster. I made an attempt to go birding on New Years Eve morning with Jeremy Bensette, with the intention of finding some reported Brewers Blackbirds. This posting is a report on that outing from Yesterday.

Out in the Onion Fields, we got good looks at large flocks of Snow Buntings and Lapland Longspurs. One flock at the east end of "Road C" must have had well over 150 Lapland Longspurs! At one point, a small gravel parking lot adjacent to the Onion Fields was covered in Longsurs. As we drove up , the majority of them flushed but a few remained. Large mixed flocks of Snow Buntings were nice to see, as I did not see any about 1.5 weeks ago when I participated in the Lakeshore CBC.

 Another highlight from this outing was to finally see a nice (first of season) dark-morph Rough legged Hawk! I have attempted to see some in the Pleasent Valley area near Kingsville/Harrow but have dipped so far in seeing one (this season). The cloudy/windy cold conditions made photography difficult but at one point, this bird was kiting almost directly above our car! I see so many hawks that end up being Red-tailed Hawks, that I really get excited seeing a rough legged hawk!

On Dec 28th, I was going to Colasanti's in Kingsville and stopped by to see the reported Ross's Goose at Jack Miners Bird Sactuary. It seems like they really made some nice habitat in that field across the road!  I found a Cackling Goose while looking for the Ross's Goose. 

Convincing Cackler?

My ebird checklist can be found here: http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist?subID=S16176366

Good birding,
Dwaynejava

Purple Sandpiper and Glaucous Gull a Nice Finish to 2012

***Happy New Year!***

Yesterday, I had been birding in the late morning, near Kingsville.  I wanted to see some Snow Buntings and knew of a great field where they tend to be easily seen. I had good luck with them, I had amazing views of Snow Buntings and Lapland Longspurs when I finally decided to drive home and do some chores. I happened to check my email and read about Blake's posting about all the great birds at Lighthouse Cove, including a potential lifer, a bunch of white-winged Glaucous Gulls! ... But then, I noticed on my phone that I had a text from Kory Renaud... "Purple Sandpiper at the tip"...!?!?!? To my dismay, the message was about 3 hours old!  Long story short, I twitched the Purple Sandpiper. I was at some crossroads in the county so I used a GPS to get me to Point Pelee in the least amount of time.

While I was writing this posting, it was funny for me to read two blog posts below share this same story but from two different perspectives, if you have time, check out Kory & Jeremy's take on this  awesome bird!

Upon arriving to the tip, I had brought my camera and a my scope. Nobody was around at the tip so I was going to have to find this amazing sandpiper myself ... if it was even still there! The wind at the tip was brutal, it must have been 50+KM... It was difficult just to stand, even my scope would be blown over if I did not hold onto it. After picking up my sand-encrusted scope off the beach for the second time, BOOM... I had found it, surprisingly close actually on the East Beach.

This was an amazing lifer. To think I've been looking at this bird in my birding field guides for three years, wondering if I would have to travel great distances just to see this bird. Further, I had read about this bird in Ontbirds postings from hotspots around Lake Ontario: Presqu'ile Provincial Park in Brighton, Bronte Beach, Niagara Falls, Kettle Point (Lake Huron)... But finally, Point Pelee hosts this excellent bird if only for an afternoon before it heads off. ... Who knows, it might stay for a while, I was thinking about how the west beach has lots of mossy, wave-washed rocks that is ideal habitat for this bird.

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Purple_Sandpiper/lifehistory

The sandpiper was associating with a few Starlings and a few (4) American Pipits. The wind was brutal so I did not linger at the tip. Blake's Ontbirds posting about Lighthouse Cove was on my mind. My GPS calculated a trip from PPNP to LC in less than 30 mins... So I was off!

Upon arriving at Lighthouse Cove on Lake St Clair, it was nice to see Jeremy Bensette as well as a few other familiar faces. Lighthouse Cove had lots of great birds to look at, including Pied-billed and Great- Horned Grebes. I've never seen so many Greater black-backed Gulls... (50+???) they were abundant!

Can you find Glaucous Gulls in this photo? This was the best I could do for an identification shot... It was cool to debate with Kory and Jeremy about the gulls. Some were pure white (from 200+ meters away) and others had light-grey backs ... which caused some debate about what we were looking at, we decided juvenile and adult birds in winter plumage respectively. See Cornell's online bird reference for more info about Glaucous Gulls here: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Glaucous_Gull/id

Good birding!
Dwayne

Lifer Summary:
Purple Sandpiper: #314
Glaucous Gull:  #315

Informally Birding the Holiday Beach CBC

(Note:This is an old posting from Dec 27th that I never got around to publishing until today)

Holiday Beach (in Amherstburg) had its CBC on Dec 27, 2012. I had participated in last's year's CBC but this year, I couldn't commit to the full morning. I still wanted to get out there though in the early afternoon, even just to walk the area on my own and enjoy the nice weather. As I approached Holiday Beach, I noticed a several fields with Snow Buntings and Horned Larks, and got a quick glimpse of at least two Lapland Longspurs (see photo above).

Here are some of the birds I saw while informally birding HBMO-CBC*:

Amherstburg side roads leading to HBMO
75 Snow Buntings
50 Horned Larks
2 Lapland Longspurs

Holiday Beach Memorial Forest
1 Northern Harrier
2 Red tailed Hawks
10 Black capped Chickadees
4 Red breasted Nuthatches
3 Tundra Swans (flyover)

HBMO Main Forest Pathway
6 White throated Sparrows
2 Downy Woodpeckers
1 Red bellied Woodpecker
3 Red breasted Nuthatches
1 Hermit Thrush
3 Northern Cardinals
3 American Goldfinches
1 Carolina Wren

On the way home, I took a detour through Harrow and found the following:

4 American Kestrels
2 Northern Shrikes
1 Short eared Owl
1 Rough legged Hawk
4 Red tailed Hawks
120 Snow Buntings
30 Morning Doves

Northern Shrike !

And another Northern Shrike !

I was really excited about seeing a Northern Shrike again today, and then, another shortly after! I totally missed seeing one in 2011... They are so rare in my opinion but this is my third this month! Hermit Thrush and Fox Sparrow** were pretty nice to see, not mega-rarities, but still good birds to see in the last week of December.

I plan on doing a 2012 year in review as my first posting in 2013.  I will also try to join the Detroit River (Ojibway Park) CBC on Jan 1 2013.  Happy New Year!

Good birding!
Dwayne

*PS:I am going to officially start using Ebird in 2013.

**PSS: On boxing day, we had a really nice snowstorm, so I figured I would head over to Ojibway Park to see if I could get some nice photos in the snow. The usual feeder birds were present, (House Finch, Tufted Titmouse, Cardinals etc) but to my astonishment, a Fox Sparrow perched into a tree next to the feeders where I was standing!