Soggy, Sedgy Saturday - Sedge Wren at Point Pelee

Point Pelee Sedge Wren

Its been about two weeks since I went to Pelee so I was very excited to get out and do some birding today. Of course, the weather has been brutally cold and rainy lately and birds were scarce at Pelee today. Still, there were some great birds to see. Of note was a Sedge Wren that has been hanging around the tip of Point Pelee for the last few days. I had briefly seen and heard Sedge Wrens at Carden Alvar in the past but this is perhaps my first chance to really see / photograph the bird well. I had to stand around and wait perhaps an hour to get just a brief glance at this little wren. Hearing it call from the grasses and brush piles of Sparrow Field was really nice - and made the wait a little more bearable.

Other good birds today included singles of about 9 species of Warblers, several thrushes were noted as well as a generous number of Red headed Woodpeckers.

It was great to see many birding friends at Pelee. There was a memorial bench and plaque dedicated to Alan Wormington unveiled near the visitor center entrance at about 11am today. Many people were present to remember a friend and mentor that left us too early.

Good Birding,
Dwayne

http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S36607340

Holiday Beach Flora & Fauna

Trout Lillies

White Trout Lillies - Rare!

I went for a family walk at Holiday Beach on Sunday this past weekend. I noted a large swath of Yellow Trout Lillies which was nice, but then as I continued walking, I noticed smaller White Trout Lillies. It was a nice little botanical discovery. I don't think I've seen the white version of the native Trout Lillie Plant so that was pretty exciting!

Yellow Warbler

I also had my first Yellow Warbler on Sunday at Holiday Beach. Its always fun to see that beautiful yellow bird so I must note my first view of it! Speaking of Yellow Warblers, Holiday Beach has excellent habitat for another "yellow warbler" - the Prothonotary Warbler! The sloughs look excellent and lets hope this habitat invites this beautiful bird to this park this spring.

Solitary Sandpiper - By Itself!

Other birds seen were Greater, Lesser Yellowlegs, Solitary Sanpiper as well as about 40 other expected species in this habitat. A new beach facility has been built as well. Pretty nice!

Two more Eastern Phoebes were seen as well. I know,,,, its weird but I just haven't really seen them this spring! I think these two bring my total to 6 this April!

Good birding,
Dwaynejava

Migration Faucet Slowly Opening

Just a photo-share tonight. I birded Ojibway park for 15 minutes this morning before work. It was exciting to hear my FOY House Wren along with my FOY Brown Thrasher. I heard the Thrasher with its smile-inducing double-note mimid sounds last night, but it was sculking in a thicket! They love to perch on tall trees in the morning... as I've observed in all my recent Florida trips. Green Heron, Warbling Vireo and Palm Warbler are FOY... pretty exciting for pre and post work brief walks!

 

It was nice to use my scope tonight to look at the Green Heron and Solitary Sandpiper. ... At one point, the Sandpiper was balancing on a tree branch in good light and I had amazing views of it. Scope ownership is good!


Saw tonnes of butterflies today as well, including a giant Eastern Tiger Swallowtail.

Good birding!
Dwaynejava

Early October Birding at Point Pelee & Holiday Beach

Sure enough, once last week's low pressure system moved off to the east, trailing north winds followed this counter-clockwise spinning weather system. Birding Point Pelee's West beach towards the tip had fall-out numbers ( 'fallout' is the most overused term of birders, but ya... I said it!) of late season warblers. This posting describes Saturday at Point Pelee and Sunday at Holiday Beach.

Hillman Marsh***
Hillman was my first stop, and it was cold, windy and just barely raining. I walked from the parking lot to the shorebird cell, only to see nothing until my walk back to the parking lot. As I walked back to the lot, I think I flushed a small Rail of some sort. It was very dark and I recall seeing redish in its wings or scapulars. Really weird, it was about the size of a red-winged blackbird with an upright posture. I have no idea what it was! I then flushed a Ring necked Pheasant. No photos...

Point Pelee's Delaurier Trail***
It was quiet on this path, but probably because there were raptors everywhere overhead.  Sharp shinned, Coopers, even Bald Eagles were constantly criss-crossing the area.  A Solitary Sandpiper greeted me in the parking lot. The snickering call of Belted Kingfishers was heard all day if you were anywhere near water. Along west beach, along the North Dyke road, and even the wet sloughs of Delarier trail had many Kingfishers (see top photo).  Thrushes and a small pocket of warblers were seen near the Delaurier Home.

 

The Tip and West Beach Footpaths***
Merlins, Sharp Shinned, Coopers, Bald Eagles were easily seen overhead, and along the scrubby trees along west beach, Grey-Cheeked Thrushes and Swainsons Thrushes were everywhere. White crowned Sparrows along with Yellow-Rumped and Palm Warblers (hundreds seemingly) with lesser numbers of Black throated Green, Magnolia and Common Yellowthroat warblers. This was great birding, I can't recall seeing so many birds at the tip of Point Pelee, even though it was lots of birds with little variety.

 

Southernmost Sanderling. Two Sanderlings and a Rudy Turnstone ignored visitors at the tip.

Holiday Beach***
Sunday, I stopped by Holiday Beach with my wife and son, and we saw many of the same warblers along the beach, Norther Parula and Red eyed Vireo were nice along with a FOS (first of season) Eastern Phoebe. Kestrels, Sharp Shinned, Coopers, Broad winged, TV's, and Bald Eagles constantly streamed over the tower. We only visited for a short time though.

Shake your Buteo. Broad winged Hawk with its Spade-shaped belly markings.

Probably added too many photos in this posting... Oddly enough, the most common bird (yellow rumped warbler) was not featured in this posting.

Good birding!
Dwaynejava

Black billed Cuckoo, just by chance!

I woke up early today and did the typical Tilbury/ Hillman Marsh/ Point Pelee circuit with little to show for it!

Its hard to beleive that last year at about this time, I saw my 200th bird, the Solitary Sandpiper. I've painstakingly added 78 more species since then... will I make it to 300? :^)

Tilbury - As Blake mentioned, the shorebird cell is almost completely dry, just a few square meters of water left, concentrating the few shorebirds to a small area near the dyke road. Nothing new or noteworthy. Long billed Dowitchers, Solitary Sandpipers, Least and Stilt Sandpipers with two species of Plover.  I noted several Horned Larks (with Killdeers) on the gravel roadway as well.

Hillman Marsh - Many Egrets, GB Herons, Green Herons, Belted Kingfishers, were around. No surprises or rarities seen. A Common Yellowthroat and a Marsh Wren were making noise in a Phragmites thicket near the wetland cell.

Point Pelee's Marsh - I kayaked Point Pelee's Marsh and saw all the same birds as last week. Black bellied Plover (no Golden Plover yet!), Short billed Dowitcher, Stilt Sandpiper, Spotted Sandpiper were seen. West Cranberry Pond had an assortment of gulls, shorebirds as well as hundreds of Cormorants were seen. Two raptors seen in the marsh were a distant Northern Harrier and a Juvi Bald Eagle which flew almost 20m over my head. Pretty cool but not shocking... . I wanted to bird other parts of Pelee, possibly to find a rare flycatcher (yellow bellied or olive sided would be lifers) but as usual, I ran out of time. 

I spotted a spotless spotted sandpiper. The baring on its back is diagnostic for juvi's.

The highlight of the day was driving through the onion fields and noticing my friend Rick from Leamington. We drove by each other and then Rick did a three point turn. We pulled up to each other and talked a little about life and work. As we spoke, I noticed a large, skulking bird with an oddly horizontal posture. Black billed Cuckoo, photographed from my car. Notice the red eye ring and long tail extending below the branch!

Next weekend, I would like to check out Holiday Beach for warblers and possibly a trip to Pointe Mouillee in Michigan for some shorebirds. Last years trip netted 10 lifers... Buff breasted Sandpipers and Marbled Godwits to name a few.

Good birding,
Dwaynejava

Ojibway Seasonal Specialties

 I had a posting for last weekend's OFO trip to PPNP but I just couldn't hit the publish button... I had a short, uneventful trip, but at least I saw many great birders from near and far.  Unfortunately, I was sick Sunday and just not feeling good. I don't know how I got out of bed at 7 am on Sunday!!! Three birds of interest where a Swainson's Thrush, Greater black backed gull, and an unidentified owl I flushed on West beach as I was eyeing a Ruby crowned kinglet.

This week, I have really found myself busy with work and my night classes that I'm taking at the U. I did get out once or twice to Ojibway Park. Tonight's walk was surprisingly good!

It only dawned on me when I got home, but a photo I took of a juvenile Red Headed Woodpecker had a juvenile Yellow bellied Sapsucker in the same tree! I watched a Red breasted Nuthatch crack sunflower seeds from about 4m away... I saw Yellow Rumped, Bay-poll and American Redstart along with Ruby and Golden Crowned Kinglets. Solitary Sandpipers are almost guaranteed to be seen in the round pond at Ojibway, I think I'm 5/5 in my last 5 trips to the park.

 This Blackpoll warbler just sat on a branch for a few minutes after eating a little bug. I put the camera away and checked it out (with my new binoculars) for a few minutes.

I can't believe there was a Red headed Woodpecker at Ojibway again! I hope I run into this bird more in the future! Sorry about the mediocre photos... they are basically proof shots. The woodpeckers flushed shortly after I even noticed they were there.

This Kinglet is just a little bigger than a Hummingbird but so fidgety!

I will probably try to go to Holiday Beach tomorrow after work.

Good birding!
Dwayne

Hillman Marsh & Point Pelee in Late September

 Wing-tagged Egret 10E at Hillman

Even though my birding travails as of late have been basically fruitless, I couldn't help but stop by Hillman Marsh this morning. When I arrived, I walked over to the bridge over Hillman Creek,  and I quickly noticed a wing-tagged Egret! I was going to add a caption.. "don't label me" (to the photo above)... but when I add captions lately, it prevents the reader from seeing the larger version of the photo. Some Yellowlegs and some peeps were around Hillman this morning, but nothing overly exciting.

 I might be wrong on the ID here, but this shorebird was quite larger than those around it and has a slightly upturned bill. The Sibley field guide to Eastern N American birds statest that the bill length of a Greater Yellowlegs is about 1.5x the length of its head (Lesser has a bill length equal to the length of its head). Having seen many Solitary Sandpipers lately, I'm actually amazed at how similar they look to the Greater & Lesser Yellowlegs!

I then proceeded to Point Pelee and headed straight to the visitor center. I had read on the Point Pelee Twitter page that there were many Kinglets and Vireos lately. I was hoping the sightings book would hint at where to find them. But the sightings book listed exclusive raptors over the last few days.  I figured I would go to the tip of the park. There seemed to be very birds on my last two PPNP trips. Are the raptors scaring them away or am I just missing them???


The tip of Point Pelee was very sparse this morning when I went,  and I saw very little with the exception of one small pocket of passerines along the east beach about 20m south of the 42 parallel path.

  Yellow Rumped in great light and razor sharp focus... Click for larger view...

In a fleeting 2 minutes I saw:
Red Breasted Nuthatch
Flycatcher
Yellow Rumped Warbler
Cape May Warbler
Nashville Warbler
American Redstart
Blue Jays

Above them were
Red Tailed Hawks
Turkey Vultures
Sharp Shinned Hawks
Merlin/Peregrin Falcon

 I ran into Rick from Leamington as I was leaving the park and we quickly checked out Delaurier for some Golden Crowned Kinglets that he had seen earlier. Rick has taken some incredible photos and video footage since I've seen him last. I would like to publish some of his video or at least link to them if he puts them online.

Merlin or Peregrine Falcon? My field guide isn't helping on this one.

Overall, I find that the passerine migration has really slowed down, at least from my meager observations. I wish I would have seen a Lincoln's Sparrow or some Vireos, but I guess some Raptors and a tiny group of warblers will do.

Good Birding!
Dwayne

Bonus: Last night after work, I saw this Solitary Sandpiper at Ojibway Park. ... But not much else!