Backtrack Birding & Blogging : Biking at Ojibway Park - May 6th & May 8th 2018

***Editors Note: This was an unpublished posting from May 2018. Its being published in November 2018 so the context of the posting is passed now***

Since I spent the full day at Point Pelee yesterday, I figured I would go to my local forest and tried my luck at Black Oak Heritage Park today.  It was a pretty good trip. I had good looks at Black throated green Warbler, N. Parula, Brown Thrasher, Yellow throated Vireo and one of my favorite birds, a Red-headed Woodpecker!

The interesting thing about the Yellow throated Vireo is that I very clearly heard one  singing in a tree above the path I was driving my bike on. I just stopped my bike, put the kickstand up and immediately saw the Yellow throated Vireo! To my amazement, there was a pair of Vireos in this tree. Were they migrants or a mated pair that are in the process of nesting???

I started this post around May 6th - and had just left it incomplete and unpublished. I've added a photo of a Blue winged Warbler - which I saw at Ojibway just a few days after I took the photos in this posting. I guess if you consider the Pine Warblers, the Rusty Blackbirds, the Cerulean and Yellow throated Vireo that was seen at Ojibway --- it goes to show that there is decent birding to be had right here in West Windsor. I imagine many birds are simply going undetected because there are so few birders that bird the park.


Good birding!
Dwayne

Selected Photos While Birding at Point Pelee May 7th

I walked the park today from about 7am-12 noon. I left feeling disappointed --- it seemed dead, but there was some diversity to be found singles of several warbler species. In hindsight, it wasn't too bad.

This might be a Grey cheeked Thrush, not a Hermit Thrush. Any thoughts?

This Red Trillium was seen at Kopegaron Woods, not Pelee

These little white flowers were found at Ojibway Park this week. My Audubon's Botany guide (donated by reader Irene) indicates that these flowers are named Pussytoes because the little white flowers look like a kittens paws... That is botany for you ... :p

Black Necked Stilts and Ontario's Endangered Species Act

Birding has been slow with the lingering low pressure system to the south of us and the gorgeous weather we've been getting but its still been pretty interesting. Saturday this past weekend, it was slow but some cool birds were seen. One was a Least Flycatcher (Empidonax Minimus) that I was able to hear calling (It makes a scratchy Che Bec sound) and watch flycatch from just one or two feet above the forest floor. This is the first time I've seen this species on its northbound migration, (a small victory for me as a birder... ) and a great way to learn its call. Woodland Nature trail gave some nice looks at Veery, Yellow throated Vireo, Blackburnian Warbler, Blue winged, Yellow and Nashville. The Vireo and Blackburnian were FOS and very exciting to see.

Sunday afternoon, Todd Pepper ontbirded an extremely rare (locally) shorebird, Black necked Stilts, and I couldn't help but go see it. I actually took my 3 year old son with me to see these birds, but at the time we were present, they were very distant. Still, with my new scope in tow, I had pretty satisfying looks at the birds. Later on Sunday night, the Stilts moved back to the shorebird cell giving front-lit, fetal-position-inducing views of these mega rare, mega giant shorebirds. Funny thing that happened was that I had set up my scope, found the birds, and person after person walked by wanting to see the birds, I graciously invited people to look, when one lady was like ... "Oh... they just took off... they're long gone". Note to self, don't be so friendly with scope :-)

 What's your impression of Chris Hadfield's recent photo of Southern Ontario? https://twitter.com/Cmdr_Hadfield . One thing I noticed was the lack of forest cover. Its pathetic no? You can actually see the Pinery, Point Pelee, Rondeau and Cedar Creek amounst the farm fields. The most damning thing as well is to compare Michigan to Ontario along the Sarnia River. Wow.

 

A concluding link for any Ontario Nature lovers that are reading this blog: Please check out David Suzuki's link and campaign to raise awareness of new laws that will undo any laws that were made six years ago regarding endangered species protection. I have personally visited the link and signed the petition, I encourage any other bloggers to re-tweet this, and perhaps even start to follow David Suzuki's Facebook page.  Funny how the media never mentioned anything about dismantling the Endangered Species Act!?!?!?

http://www.davidsuzuki.org/blogs/panther-lounge/2013/05/last-change-to-salvage/

https://www.facebook.com/DavidSuzuki

Good birding,
Dwaynejava

Black necked Stilts - 331

Early May Birding at Pelee

So many things to talk about bird-wise! Took a personal day on Friday (May 4th) and spent a good day birding Point Pelee. Some personal highlights for me were seeing Red headed Woodpeckers and 5 species of Vireo ( White eyed, Yellow throated, Warbling, Red eyed, Blue headed) along with... 80 species of birds. I didn't really count or list them, but you get the point.

Some Random Thoughts (in point form for brevity and clarity):

• I was mucking around with my "blog templates" and irreversibly changed my original template to the "newer style" of templates.  I really liked my old template, so I spent much time trying to customize my new template to look like my old one, but still... its not the same. :-(
• I must have 70 photos that I would like to share, but I only chose 8 or so to add to this posting. 
• I just bought a new cellphone and this was the first time I was birding while texting. More on the subject of "Technobirding" later.
• Butterflies are everywhere this year. Amazing variety and its only the first week of May.
• Its amazing how different people will see a completely different set of birds. A flickr friend had YB Chats and Summer Tanagers on this same Friday May 4th. 
• Every year, it seems different birds seem to be more present than others. Last year, I hardly saw any Black throated blue Warblers, where this year, I've seen many. Same with Yellow throated Vireos. I guess its this randomness that keeps things interesting. 
• Lots of variety at Pelee, but seemingly low numbers. It seems that each bird was hard fought for this year. It seems also to be slower than previous years, but perhaps things are the same, the only change being the lack of 'life bird rush' that I was getting in the previous years.
• I did not hear or see a Wood Thrush yet this season... Seems odd no? I did see Hermit, Veery and Swainson's.

I had breathtaking looks at this beautiful yellow throated vireo... nuff said.

 

I was on West Beach Trail when I heard a "Fitz-Bew" call of a Flycatcher. I pished a little and a few warblers came to inspect the noise. I must have taken 15 photos of this white eyed vireo each as amazing as the next. What an amazing bird... I never saw the flycatcher until further down the path. I think it was a Least Flycatcher, based on the eye-rings.

A Point Pelee Specialty... Also seen at Ojibway in Windsor

Even though pretty common, and a local breeder, its always nice to see GCFs.

 Hillman Marsh

After Pelee, I drove over to Hillman Marsh proudly bearing a scope over my shoulder. Nothing super rare I guess, but a few nice birds included Green winged Teal, seasonal Terns, Black bellied Plover in stunning breeding plumage.  American Golden Plovers and Long billed Dowitcher were the highlights, and seeing them through my new scope was awesome.

American Golden Plover in a heavily cropped photo. Notice the greenish golden coloured plovers behind the horizontal row of bonaparte's gulls & terns. Black bellied Plovers in the foreground.

While shorebirding at Hillman, I realized I was standing next to and talking to Jean Iron. Wow! I realized it was her as she had mentioned Blenheim SL and I had just read her Ontbirds posting a few hours earlier.  The birding community is pretty small isn't it?

Good birding,
Dwaynejava

Decent birds but terrible weather!

Do the birding gods hate me? It rained all morning on the one morning I had to bird one one of the best weekends of the year. This May 1st pales in comparison to last years May 1st 2010 outing.

On  a more positive note, I got some good looks at Vireos today. If one excludes the weather as a factor, it wasn't that bad a day considering the fact that I had to leave at 11:30 am.

Blue headed Vireo
Yellow throated Vireo (Lifer #237)
Warbling Vireo
Least Flycatcher
Grey Catbird
Wood Thrush (I took shaky video as well)
Veery
Hermit Thrush
Swainson's Thrush (Friday)
Northern Flicker
Red belllied Woodpecker

Ok, is this a Swainson's Thrush? It has huge buffy eyerings, olive flanks, drab grey-brown back... Not a lifer though. I believe I saw one two years ago in Florida, although I didn't study its features as I did today. Hillman Marsh always seems to have good birds...

Other Passerines included:

Black and White
Yellow rumped
Black throated Blue
Black throated Green
Palm
Blue Grey Gnatcatcher
Even a Red Breasted Nuthatch was seen!

I missed a Worm-eating Warbler today at the tram loop... (&)(^%!!!
...

and the 25 other common birds mentioned on the last posting!

It was nice to see some great views of Blue headed Vireo today... that was the highlight for me :^)

Good birding,
Dwaynejava

PS:  May 2nd is my official 2-year birding anniversary.
PSS: Incredible birds are showing up at Point Pelee, YB Chats, Prothnotary Warblers and Worm Eating. Of course, I have not seen them.