OFO convention

Just got back from a weekend of some fun, and birding! It was the annual OFO (Ontario Field Ornitholigist's) general meeting, so my Dad, my brother Mike and his wife Erica and I trekked down to Point Pelee, to do some birding. I'll give a break-down of each day and what we saw, and where.

Friday:
I had to work (doing some bird surveys!) down near Selkirk. It was a pretty early morning, as we had to be on-site for sunrise (7am). It was really cool, with some very light North winds, so there was some activity.

Tufted Titmouse -2
Philadelphia Vireo - 1
10 species of warblers - Nasvhille (2), Chestnut-sided (1), Blackpoll (4), Blackburnian (1), Black-throated Green (3), Black-and-white (1), Palm (1), Yellow-rumped (1), A. Redstart (3), and C Yellowthroat (2).

After gettting back from work, we headed straight down (sorta) to Point Pelee. Stopping first at Mitchell, we had some interesting shorebirds;
American Golden-Plover - 312!!!
Black-bellied Plover - 4
White-rumped -10
Stilt - 2 
Merlin - 1

After hitting up Mitchell, we booked 'er over to the Port Stanley lagoons, and had some decent birds.
Red-necked Phalarope - 2 juvs.
Stilt -1
White-rumped - 2

Saturday - Point Pelee NP, Seacliffe and Holiday Beach
Baird's Sandpiper - 1 Onion Fields
12 species of warblers - new species from Friday (Tennessee, Magnolia, Wilson's, Black-throated Blue and Bay-breasted)
Red-headed Woodpecker - 1 at the Pelee Days Inn
Peregrine Falcon - 1 at Seacliffe
Common Nighthawk - 3 at Holiday Beach

Sunday - Tilbury, Prairie Siding
SNOWY EGRET - 1, this was a longish overdue Ontario bird for me!!!

Snowy Egret - near Prairie Siding, September 18, 2011

This bird was found the previous day, by one of the OFO field trips. We thought we might as well try for it, since its not too far from Tilbury (and Hwy, 401). As we were driving along the river, we saw 2 egrets flying alongside us, and as luck would have it, one was the Snowy!

Buff-breasted Sandpiper - 7(!) in a large field with other shorebirds on Richardson Sideroad
American Golden-Plover - 56 - in the same field as the BBSA's
White-rumped Sandpiper - 14 at Tilbury Sewage Lagoons

Overall a pretty sweet weekend (110 species), we had great weather and even better company!

Van Wagner's

With some fairly good N/NE winds starting last night and continuing into today, I decided to book it over to Van Wagner's this morning. I arrived around 8:30am, staying until 1pm. Pretty good activity. As soon as I arrived a Jaeger flew by as well as a Whimbrel. Jaeger's put in appearances throughout the day. Shorebirds were also zipping past, overall a pretty enjoyable morning.

Here the rundown of what I saw;

Parasitic Jaeger - 6 - (3 dark juv., 2 intermediate juv. and 1 light adult)
Long-tailed Jaeger - 1 light/intermediate
Unidentified Jaeger spp. - 10 (all were juvenals, 2 of which I think were likely Long-tail's)


Whimbrel - 1
Sanderling - 167!! - all fly-by's
Ruddy Turnstone - 2
White-winged Scoter - 3
Merlin - 1

Some good diversity of ducks flew by as well. I even managed to get a pic. of a juvenal Parasitic!

juvenal Parasitic Jaeger - Van Wagner's September 10, 2011

Port Stanley-Townsend

Brandon Holden and I birded the north shore of Erie today, from Port Stanley to Port Dover/Townsend. We stopped first at Port Stanley, where we saw the following;

Hudsonian Godwit - 1
Red-necked Phalarope - 10
Stilt Sandpiper - 3

Hudsonian Godwit - distant record shot - September 4, 2011

Next we proceeded east along the lake, where we stopped at Port Burwell. Walking through the park, to the beach, netted a few songbirds (Philadelphia Vireo, Bay-breasted, Blackpoll and Wilson's Warblers). Thousands of gulls were either on the beach, or close to shore. Most notable were at least 17 Little Gull's a few hundred metres offshore. There is likely many more, though this was a minimum count.

Heading east, the last main stop, which yielded 'results' was the Townsend lagoons, where we had the following;

Red-necked Phalarope - 1
Stilt Sandpiper - 2
Baird's Sandpiper - 4
Merlin - 1

Eastern Ontario

This past week I was working just south-west of Cornwall, I've been doing some pretty sweet birding around this area of Ontario. I haven't done any birding in this area, but it was really productive.

Tuesday and Wednesday led me to bird some good areas. First up, I headed over to Osgoode, where I picked up a Buff-breasted Sandpiper, found earlier in the day. I managed a VERY poor shot of it poking its head out of the grasses.

worst pic of a Buff-breasted Sandpiper - EVER

Next stop was the Casselman lagoons. I had gone here the previous night (Monday). I had pretty much the exact same stuff, minus Red-necked Phalarope, but managed a few pics of the Red Knots, which were still present.

Red Knot - Casselman sewage lagoons

This lagoon is pretty sweet. Tuesday evening I also had a Stilt Sandpiper.


Wednesday evening I headed up to Alfred, to try for a Hudsonian Godwit, seen two nights previously, by Jacques Bouvier. These lagoons are AWESOME! Its a shame they're so far from Waterloo! No sign of the HUGO, but shorebird numbers were impressive, nonetheless. I had the following shorebirds;
Semipalmated Plover - 30+
Killdeer - 70+
Spotted - 1
Solitary - 2
Greater Yellowlegs - 10
Lesser Yellowlegs - 120
Semipalmated Sand - 140
Least - 25
Baird's - 8!
Pectoral - 8
Stilt - 1

Just down the road at one of the sod farms, while hoping for another Buff-breasted Sandpiper, I stumbled across this 'getting late' Upland Sandpiper in one of the fields.

Upland Sandpiper - Alfred Bog

Anyways, I just got back, was a pretty interesting few days!

Casselman

Work has taken me again....this time to Eastern Ontario, near Ottawa. I'm staying out in Morrisburg this week and have several spots I'm going to be checking. This evening, I checked out Embrun and the Casselman sewage lagoons. Conditions at Casselman are really good. I had 13 species of shorebirds in the farthest cell, including;

Red Knot - 2 - first time I've seen one since 2009
Red-necked Phalarope - 1

Semipalmated Plover - 35
Killdeer - 50
Spotted - 1
Greater Yellowlegs - 20
Lesser Yellowlegs - 120
Sanderling - 1
Semipalmated - 55
Least - 25
Pectoral - 8
Stilt - 1
Short-billed Dowitcher - 1
Ruddy Duck

Checked out the Embrun sewage lagoons too. The lagoons are high and no shorebird habitat exists, but 16 Ruddy Ducks and a Lesser Scaup were present.

An aside...yesterday I toured Lake Erie, from Port Stanley to Port Burwell, then B-lined it Van Wagner's. Kinda crazy I know....didn't have too much at Port Stanley, highlights of the day

Little Gull - 17!!!! at Port Burwell - pretty crazy numbers for so early
Red-necked Phalarope - 8 off Van Wagner's

Peregrine Falcons - watching 2 separate birds kill shorebirds at Windermere Basin!

Mitchell

Checked out the Milverton and Mitchell sewage lagoons yesterday. A pretty nice day for some birding, first stop was Milverton.

I just started checking this place out, it doesn't really have shorebird habitat, but the fact that its on the way to Mitchell and 'fairly' close to Waterloo is good incentive. This is more of a duck lagoon, with several species present. Had the following;

2 Pied-billed Grebes
19 Northern Shovelers
25 Blue-winged Teal
2 Green-winged Teal
30 Wood's
1 Greater Yellowlegs
10 Lesser Yellowlegs

Here's an aerial map of the lagoons, the southern cell has most of the ducks and shorebirds. The two middle cells on the right, are sprinkler cells, which might be the spot where the next Avocet shows up. Its abit of a hike, but when something good shows up, it'll be worth the walk!

 

Next stop was Mitchell, the lagoons, continue drying up, so there gettin' good. Over the years I've had 25 species of shorebirds, today we had 12 species....nothing crazy or anything, but some nice diversity.

American Golden-Plover - 9 

Black-bellied Plover - 4

Semipalmated Plover - 2

Killdeer - 30

Spotted Sandpiper - 3

Lesser Yellowlegs - 40

Greater Yellowlegs - 3

Semipalmated - 25

Least - 15

Pectoral -5

Stilt - 1

Wilson's Snipe - 2

My top finds EVER (part two of two)

Ross's Gull - December 8, 2007 Niagara Falls
I found this bird flying around the base of the falls with a huge group of Bonaparte's Gull's. Initially I thought this bird was a weird Little Gull, but crazily not! Beware of how dark the underwing of Ross's can be! A few weeks later (late January), the same bird (likely) was found at the falls and spent a few days.

Say's Phoebe - April 29, 2006 - Long Point Tip
This bird was technically found by someone else....and the day before. While not technically countable as a bird found by myself I've included it. This bird was found the day before I 'found' it. I was arriving at the Tip April 28th and looked for it for several hours, only to run out of daylight. Assuming it was gone, I continued birding as per usual, only to find it about a kilometre west of where it was last seen on the afternoon of the 28th. I got some nice looks, and thoroughly enjoyed the thrill of 'finding' it again. 

Say's Phoebe - Copyright Mike Boyd

Spotted Towhee - May 4, 2005 Breakwater, Long Point
While not the most spectacular find, this bird was special for 2 reason's; 1) it was a new bird for Long Point and 2) it was another great bird found in 2005. I was spending the spring volunteering. Myself and two other volunteers (Benoit and Matt) and I were walking when we found this bird along Courtright Ridge. We got some great looks. Last year 2 separate Spotted Towhee's showed up at Long Point.

Painted Bunting - May 19, 2003 Breakwater, Long Point
In high school my parents would let me take 1-2 weeks off in May, just so I could go down to Long Point and volunteer at the bird observatory. In 2003, I was able to get to one of the remote banding stations at Long Point - Breakwater. Breakwater is alittle rustic to say the least, but awesome in its own right. During the night of 18th/19th the fridge in the cabin had a propane leak, waking us up to burning eyes and needing to be taken out of the cabin in case of a fire. So basically at around 3am two of us had to lug this old fridge out of the cabin. Luckily the next morning we were lucky enough to have this first-alternate male Painted Bunting show up, only to oblige us further and fly into one of the mist nets!

Loggerhead Shrike -  April 9-13, 2005 Hawkesville, Waterloo Region
This isn't the most crazy find, but special in a few senses. Mainly because it was so close to where I'm from and with a breeding population well below 100 individual adults in Ontario, this is pretty rare. This bird was the 1st record in Waterloo region since 1984(!), giving you a sense of how rare it has become.