Vindicated!

According to eBird, other people have since spotted my mystery bird at Presqu'ile and come to the same conclusion I did, so I think it's safe to say that I did indeed find a Prothonotary Warbler. Well outside of what is considered its usual range, as far as I know. But as a friend recently reminded me: it's migration, weird crap happens.

The obligatory bad photos:











A warbler with a bright yellow head and breast, grey wings, white undertail coverts, and no other visible markings (e.g., eye ring, wing bars, streaking). It probably should have been a no-brainer from those clues, but hey, when you find an Endangered species in a place where it really shouldn't be, you can't help but second (and third, and fourth) guess yourself.

Can You Call This Luck?

Since I was headed to the Prince Edward County area this past weekend, and since the weather was absolutely lovely, I left early on Friday and made a stop at Presqu'ile Provincial Park. The Marsh Boardwalk trail was lovely, if a bit quiet from a bird perspective (unless you count all the Mallards out on the open water). It was the Owen Point trail, though, that was my real objective.

Now, I'm no expert at shorebirds... no, that doesn't quite give the full measure of things, say rather that my experience to date with shorebirds is limited to Killdeer. So I'm not sure why I thought it would be a good idea to go out to the lakeshore during fall migration and dive in headfirst, so to speak. I think fall shorebirds are actually worse than fall warblers. Still, I took a stab at it.



This one might be a juvenile Black-bellied Plover? Mostly due to that stout, stubby little beak, in combination with the dark legs and the overall coloration.





Pectoral Sandpipers, I think? With Semipalmated Plovers running across the back of the second shot, those ones I know at least. The Pectorals have the clean line separating the dark neck from the white belly, are bigger than the Semipalmated, have yellowish legs, and the faintly downturned bill. Maybe.



I think these are all Sanderlings. The ones to the left are juveniles, and the darker one to the right is a male that hasn't quite lost his breeding plumage yet? Still a stubby, dark beak, but it looks longer than the Black-bellied Plover's. The male seemed to have redder overtones and a straighter, shorter beak than the Pectoral, even though it does have that clean line across the chest.



Another Semipalmated Plover on the left, with the full breast-band, and another possible-Sanderling on the right. Not too much difference in size between the two.





So, the one in the back with the long, downcurved bill might be a Stilt Sandpiper?  Though it looks bigger than the other bird, which might be another Sanderling, so I'm not sure... those two are supposed to be similar sizes. (CORRECTION: actually a Dunlin, pretty sure.)



These guys were really tiny, I think they're Semipalmated Sandpipers (not to be confused with the Plovers of earlier). Dark legs means they're not Least, anyway.



...yeah.  Yeah, I don't even know, they all started to look the same to me by this point. I think I need a better shorebird ID book, and also to practice a lot more.

On my way back to the car, I finally got my Blue-headed Vireo, in a mixed flock of mostly Chickadees and Yellow-rumped Warblers. I also saw something that looked like... well, I know what I think it was, but I also know that that particular bird really shouldn't have been there. So I've put out a plea for a second opinion, and will wait to speak further on that one until I've had a sanity check.

Changing Seasons Means...

Oh god, fall warblers.  Why do I do this to myself.

Places To Go, Birds To See

Just got back from a whirlwind tour of Scotland - from Stirling up past Cairngorms National Park and around Loch Ness on the way to Skye, then finally back through the Trossachs area on the way to Edinburgh. Added a grand total of 21 new species to my life list while I was there... very common species, but they were all new to me. Sadly, no really great photos of any of them - I only brought my little (waterproof) point-and-shoot camera, not my bigger one with the extra zoom.

One one hand, it was frustrating being right back at square one, hearing things singing in the brush and not having even the beginnings of a clue on how to identify them. But on the other hand, every bird was a brand new bird - it was like seeing a Cardinal again for the first time.  With a little application of basic principles (size, colour, behaviour, etc) and a little help from the locals, I think I managed to muddle through.

Spotted throughout the trip were Common Wood-Pigeon, Rook, and European Robin. The Eurasian Magpies I saw were mainly around cities (Stirling and Edinburgh).


Magpie taking in the sights at Stirling Castle


Wood-Pigeon

I did two short trail walks with the specific intention of birding, on a section of the Great Glen Way near Drumnadrochit and at the David Marshall Lodge/Queen Elizabeth Forest Park (lovely place, A++ would go again). On those two outings, I got:

- Mew Gull
- Hooded Crow
- Common House-Martin
- Great Tit
- Eurasian Blue Tit
- Eurasian Wren
- Eurasian Wigeon
- Carrion Crow (pretty sure - smaller than a Raven, but with a stouter, less pointed bill than an immature Rook)
- Coal Tit
- Common Chaffinch

With a bonus Eurasian Jackdaw in nearby Aberfoyle, which posed very nicely while I got a good look at its stubby little beak and paler grey nape.


Chaffinches

Our B&B on Skye was right near the coast, which meant that I could see Northern Gannets, Great Cormorants, Common Buzzards, and even a pair of White-tailed Eagles from my bedroom window. More eagles were found on a short boat cruise out of Portree. White Wagtails were all along the roadsides - adorable little things, they certainly live up to their name.


White Wagtail


They were there, I promise

And last but not least, Manx Shearwaters on the ferry from Armadale to Mallaig. I admit to resorting to eBird records for that area to help me narrow down the species on this one; I was taking the ferry at the time and didn't have my binocs handy, so all I really saw was a black and white bird with long, narrow wings flying agilely right along the water's surface.

And of course there were Rock Pigeons and House Sparrows and I'm pretty sure a pair of Ravens somewhere along the roadside in there (the initial reaction of "holy crap those are big birds" certainly suggests Raven to me), and various other gulls - Great or Lesser Black-backed, probably also Herring? And things that were present but wouldn't show themselves. As is always the case with birding, no matter where in the world you go.

Achievement Unlocked: 200 Species

This weekend I am proud to announce that I hit 200 species on my life list. A serendipidous Bay-breasted Warbler showed up while I was walking the scrubby, swampy back fields of the family farm yesterday, near Perth, ON. I didn't go out there looking specifically for a new bird, but there it was nonetheless, hanging out with a pair of Eastern Towhees and a beautiful male Magnolia Warbler.

It's always a little bittersweet, making that visit to the farm, since there is always that the chance that each visit will be the last (chances are good the property will be sold in the not-too-distant future). But I suppose if this one does end up being my farewell tour, at least it was suitably momentous.

Baby boom

It is that wonderful time of year when the young birds start coming around to the feeders.  A noisy family of grackles showed up a few weeks ago, with parent being harassed by three hungry kids. It's always a treat seeing the big grackles trying to balance themselves on the little tiny feeder perches long enough to get some seed out. Not quite as, erm, "graceful" as the Blue Jays, but still entertaining.

The last couple of days we've had a juvenile Downy Woodpecker hanging around the peanut feeder. We don't get many woodpeckers in our neighbourhood, so every time one comes around it's an event. And a learning experience, in this case: this little guy led me to reading about differences in head pattern, trying to determine whether one could tell apart individual birds on that basis, which is what made me realize he was a juvenile in the first place.


Here's last winter's male Downy with his sharp black and white colouring and the discrete red spot on the back of his head.


And here's the juvie from this week. Scruffier, greyer on his belly, and with a spread-out red wash over the entire crown. Also tiny, oh my goodness, he's so small, it's adorable.

The other locals - the Cardinals, Chipping Sparrows, and Chickadees - haven't starting coming by with their kids yet, nor have the inevitable Cowbirds shown up to mooch. But I've been hearing some baby Chickadees out back lately, trying very, very hard to sing like mom and dad, so it's only a matter of time.

A Most Fortuitous Meeting

I ended up in the Long Point area this week for work, and it seemed like a real shame to just head home again without stopping for a short walk somewhere. I mean, if I had already come all that way.... So I found myself a trailhead into Backus Woods, slapped on some bug spray (holy crap, mosquitoes), and ventured forth.

I saw practically nothing. Not surprising; the canopy has closed in and forest birds are experts at hiding amongst leaves. On the other hand, I heard quite a lot, including a Prothonotary Warbler (pretty sure, anyway - Backus is known to be one of the few sites in Ontario for them) and a couple of Hooded Warblers (again, pretty sure - the song sounded right). I would have loved to get eyes on either of those, because I usually don't really feel like I've "got" a bird until I see it, at least for those species whose songs I don't know like the back of my hand.  But there was just no chance. Next year I'll have to make a point to head down that way when the leaves have just started to come out, see if I can't have better luck.

Heard a bunch of things that I couldn't ID too, of course, to my continued frustration. I am still making progress in that regard, aided by the Petersons "Birding By Ear" and "More Birding By Ear" cds, and the Larkwire iPhone app. But as I'm sure I've complained before, it is slow, slow progress. I'm a very visual learner when it comes to this sort of thing; me and audio just don't click the same way.

Thanks to the two warblers, plus the Purple Martin I saw at the Bird Studies Canada office earlier in the day, my life list is now at 199. I tried to cap off 200 in style by going after the Cerulean Warbler that was supposedly singing at the Guelph Arboretum this week, but all I managed to accomplish with that trip was dropping my driver's license somewhere in the woods. Luckily, a very kind person picked it up and returned it to me the next day, so no harm was done. Let this be a lesson for all of us: zippers are your friends!

Before The Storm

I squeaked in another quick walk at the Arboretum this morning, before the rain hit. The birds were certainly taking advantage of the temporary respite, as they were all singing their little feathery hearts out. There really is something wonderful in standing out in the woods and listening to the morning chorus of birdsong. Today's headliners were the Warbling Vireos, with back-up vocalists Baltimore Oriole, Nashville Warbler, and Winter Wren.

I got my Northern Parula this time. And, thanks in no small part to the Petersons CDs I've been listening to in the car, I got it first by song alone. So progress is being made towards a mastery of ID by ear!  Slow, painstaking progress, but progress nonetheless.

There were three female Mergansers swimming around in the open-water portion of the swamp, too, which took me completely aback since I tend to think of them as river or lake birds. I immediately started debating between Red-breasted and Common, although they didn't look quite right for either... apparently Hooded was completely off my radar for some reason, which is a shame since that's what they ended up being.  Many thanks to the local mailing list for setting me straight on that one.

Coming up to a long weekend, huzzah! Although according to the current forecast it could be a damp one. Some of the locals are apparently making a trip down to Long Point on Sunday, which is very, very tempting... guess I'll have to keep watching the skies and decide at the last minute, that seems to be the way these trips work out.

It Was The Best Of Times....

It was both a satisfying weekend, and a disappointing one.  Satisfying, because the weather was gorgeous and I got some solid birding time in.  I hit up the Guelph Arboretum, the James St. Trail (in Guelph), Snyder's Flats (Waterloo), the Currie Tract (Halton), any my own back yard, seeing and/or hearing:

- Canada Goose
- Mallard
- Double-crested Cormorant
- Turkey Vulture
- Osprey
- Killdeer
- Spotted Sandpiper
- Solitary Sandpiper
- Ring-billed Gull
- Mourning Dove
- Red-bellied Woodpecker
- Downy Woodpecker
- Northern Flicker
- Eastern Phoebe
- Great Crested Flycatcher
- Eastern Kingbird
- Yellow-throated Vireo
- Red-eyed Vireo
- Blue Jay
- American Crow
- Tree Swallow
- Black-capped Chickadee
- White-breasted Nuthatch
- House Wren
- Winter Wren
- Wood Thrush
- American Robin
- Grey Catbird
- Cedar Waxwing
- Ovenbird
- Northern  Waterthrush
- Black-and-white Warbler
- Common Yellowthroat
- American Redstart
- Blackburnian Warbler
- Yellow Warbler
- Chestnut-sided Warbler
- Yellow-rumped Warbler
- Black-throated Green Warbler
- Chipping Sparrow
- Field Sparrow
- Song Sparrow
- White-crowned Sparrow
- Northern Cardinal
- Rose-breasted Grosbeak
- Red-winged Blackbird
- Eastern Meadowlark
- Common Grackle
- Brown-headed Cowbird
- Baltimore Oriole
- House Finch
- Purple Finch
- American Goldfinch

A whopping 53 species altogether. The highlights for me, I think, were the Blackburnians (because that is one seriously gorgeous bird, and I was able to get a good long look) followed by the Yellow-throated Vireo which I am proud to say I ID'd by song alone. Someone else who was out on that trail yesterday got a photo of one, so yay independent confirmation! The lowlight I have to say was the James St. Trail. Maybe it was just a case of wrong-place-wrong-time, but for a spot that has such a big species list on eBird it was really quiet. The Currie Tract was also a bit of a low, but that was mostly because I had forgotten last year's lesson and not brought my bug spray.  That is one buggy trail... I haven't had any problems with bugs anywhere else this year, but that whole area was swarming.

Getting back to my opening sentence, though, the reason the weekend was also disappointing is because while I saw lots of birds, I didn't see any new ones.  I certainly didn't see any of my target species (Northern Parula, Bay-breasted Warbler, Red-headed Woodpecker, all of which had been reported in the area by others).  But that's the nature of the hobby, isn't it?  If it was so easy to find all of the birds all of the time, it wouldn't be so rewarding when your moment finally arrives.

Spring Has Sprung

How on earth am I supposed to focus on office work when it is so wonderfully warm outside? How on earth am I supposed to focus on anything else at all when there are so many birds to see?

Knowing that the forecast calls for rain this afternoon, I made myself a bit late for work this morning by taking a pass through the Arboretum at 7am. And oh my goodness, I am glad I did.  Two brilliant male Blackburnian Warblers, two only-slightly-less brilliant male American Redstarts, lots of Black-throated Green Warblers singing.  My first Baltimore Oriole of the year.



Song Sparrows and Field Sparrows abounded.  I may have heard a Vesper Sparrow, but I'm not 100% sure. The song was similar to a Song Sparrow, but... different.  More musical and varied? But still with the same introductory-notes-followed-by-trills pattern.

 I did catch these two rival Northern Flickers facing off, which was incredibly cool to see.  They just kind of bobbed their heads at each other and posed.



(Please forgive the poor photo quality; the lighting was, of course, terrible at that moment.)

So many birds to see.  I have the feeling I'm going to spend most of my weekend outdoors.

And Now For Something Completely Different

I feel like such a bad birder, here it is hitting the peak of spring migration and I haven't picked up my binoculars in weeks.  The usual excuses apply, of course: work distractions, general life business, residual embarrassment over an unfortunate public misidentification of an American Woodcock as a Common Nighthawk... you know, the usual.

I've also been spending large chunks of my weekends hiking. This year I signed up for an end-to-end hike series in the Iroquoia section of the Bruce Trail.  Eleven other intrepid hikers and I will be tackling this 130 km section over the course of eight hikes, two of which we've now completed.  And although that sounds like it should be a perfect birding opportunity, when you're trying to keep pace and not trip over a multitude of loose rocks it doesn't actually leave much time for watching the sky. I still perk up at every song, of course... there's been Northern Flickers, Red-bellied Woodpeckers, lots of Chickadees, Cardinals, Red-winged Blackbirds and Blue Jays, and the occasional White-throated Sparrow.  But for the most part I've been leaving the binocs in my backpack and focusing on my feet instead.

The Bruce really is a beautiful trail system (roadside and urban sections aside).  It's been a treat seeing the spring ephemeral wildflowers come out, even over the course of just two weeks.


Cut-leaved Toothwort - Cardamine concatenata


Trout Lily - Erythronium americanum


Siberian Squill - Scilla siberica


Plantain-leaved Sedge - Carex plantaginea


Red Trillium - Trillium erectum


Dutchman's Breeches - Dicentra cucullaria


Wild Ginger - Asarum canadense


Blue Cohosh - Caulophyllum thalictroides


Mountain Watercress - Cardamine rotundifolia


Not photographed: the 25 snakes we saw along the trailside this past Sunday. Mostly Common Garters, but there were a couple of wee Brown Snakes out there too.

I've got the next couple of weekends off from hiking, so I fully intend to use that time to find some birds.  And also probably do more hiking, because for some reason it seems like a good idea to try and do the Toronto section of the Bruce this year too.  ...and maybe finish the Niagara section, which I started last year.  We'll see if I have any feet left by 2015!

A Bright Sunshiny Day

I spent some quality time outdoors this long weekend.  The sun was out, and it was warm without being too warm-- perfect.

Yesterday I did the rounds at the Guelph Arboretum. Saw a lot of the usual suspects: Chickadees, Mourning Doves, Downy Woodpeckers, various Nuthatches, Cardinals, and about 1.7 million Goldfinches.  Give or take.  Also spotted was a pair of Purple Finches, which was noteworthy to me, at least (I always think of them as winter birds, it was odd to see them only now when it's spring), three Northern Flickers, both Ruby- and Golden-crowned Kinglets, and a single Yellow-rumped Warbler.


(Purple Finch, sadly in the shade - note raspberry-pink colouring, lack of breast streaking, and distinct lines on face)

Today I ventured a little further, out to Snyder's Flats where the resident Osprey pair was back on the nest. The Tree Swallows looked to be setting up shop, too, squabbling over the next boxes and being their usual adorable selves.





Anyone who says they don't like Tree Swallows has got to be lying, because seriously, what's not to love? Still one of my favourites.

There were 11 Caspian Terns out on one of the ponds, also four Blue-winged Teal and some Bufflehead. And at least three Eastern Meadowlarks singing away from near the parking lot.




(Caspian Terns - note heavy orange bill, and size in comparison to the Ring-billed Gull in the second photo)


(Blue-winged Teal and Canada Goose)


(Eastern Meadowlark)

On a non-bird note, the Wood Frogs and Spring Peepers were singing at the Arboretum yesterday, and more Peepers plus Leopard Frogs at Snyder's Flats today. Guess it's finally warmed up enough for them, although I think we're supposed to get minus temperatures at night this week again.  I also saw my first snake of the year today: at least three Common Garters near the riverbank, sunning.  Wonder if there was a hibernaculum nearby?

Checking In

Not much to report from the last couple of weeks.  Not because there is nothing going on (far from it; migration is definitely underway) but because none of it makes for very good storytelling. Still, I wouldn't want you all to think I was slacking off....

The warmer temperatures have brought about the expected shift.  The river sites that the birds (and I) favoured over the winter are now flooded and fast-moving, not terribly appealing, while the forests and ponds that were silent for months are now singing like mad.  I really have missed the obnoxious shrieking of the Red-winged Blackbirds; they are my harbingers of spring.

The exposed ponds have only just started to open up, even though the snow around them is long gone.  In the space of a week Niebaur's Pond on Wellington 32 went from hosting a couple of Mallards to providing a stopover for 30+ Ring-necked Ducks, a Red-necked Grebe, a couple of Blue-winged Teal, and apparently some Ruddy Ducks (although I didn't see those when I stopped by). Most of the forest ponds and sheltered wetlands I think are still a bit iced in, but it shouldn't be long now if the weather holds. Which... it isn't supposed to, but I am determined to remain optimistic.

On my third try, I finally spotted the Horned Grebe that was haunting Riverside Park. It was diving constantly when I found it, only surfacing for a matter of seconds before going under again, so I wonder if I just wasn't patient enough on my previous visits. It certainly would have been easy to miss if I wasn't looking in just the right direction at just the right moment.



I didn't have as much luck with the Greater White-fronted Goose that was reported north of Guelph. I saw some Tundra Swans at that location (I think they were all Tundras, anyway, although admittedly I haven't yet mastered Tundra vs. Trumpeter ID), a few Northern Pintails, and of course a boatload of Canada Geese, but no White-fronted.  Ah, well; next time, maybe.

This weekend, weather permitting, I hope to revisit Niebaur's Pond and maybe the Correctional Ponds in Guelph, and take another walk through the Arboretum in search of early warblers. Fingers crossed tomorrow's cold snap will be the last one of the season!

Making The Best Of A Bad Photograph

Further to my previous post, I thought I'd go through some of the awful photos I mentioned from Windermere Basin.  Even barely-focused, extremely distant shots can sometimes be of use in figuring out what the heck you're looking at, if you get things that can be ID'd by large-scale colour patterns or size relative to other known birds.



This is probably the best of the lot, because it is at least marginally in focus despite the horrific glare. You can see the white blob wrapping around the back of the head of the male Bufflehead in the very center. Around it are multiple Ruddy Ducks, which have a white cheek and black cap (best seen on the one on the far left) and tend to swim with their tail cocked up (as with one of the group of three just right of center).



The white blob on the right is, I'm assuming, a Snow Goose. It's smaller than the Canada Goose beside it, and doesn't look like it has the long neck or dark feet of a swan.



The blurry shadow on the right is a Double-crested Cormorant - note how it's sitting very low in the water, with a long neck and long beak sticking out.



The three on the back left are Scaups, I think (don't know whether Lesser or Greater), based on the white body with black at either end.  A Ring-necked Duck would have a larger black patch on the back, extending down the sides.  Just to the right of those three is something I'm going to call a Northern Shoveler based on that bright chestnut patch surrounded by white.



Here's the size difference in gulls that I was talking about last time. Look at the Canada Goose in the background, then at the little white gull-blob front and center, then look at the monster gull at the front left. Maybe a second-winter Great Black-backed? You can kind of see a dark spot at the end of the bill, and the wings/sides are more brownish than black.

I think there's an American Coot on the front right, too.  Smaller duckish bird, overall black with a white bill. The white speck of the beak could be just a trick of the light, but it showed up in a couple other shots too so I'm willing to give it a pass.



And here's the possible black-headed gull (Laughing?  Franklin's?).  This is extremely distant and the focus is crap, so once again it's possible that it's just a trick of lighting, though it also looked similarly dark-headed in the few other shots it appeared in. So who knows? Maybe I'll have to go back next weekend and take another stab at it.

Not A Good Day To Fly

Let me tell you about Sunday.  Sunday was a glorious +7 degrees.  Sunday was sunny with nary a cloud in sight.  Sunday was... apparently not a great day to go hawk watching, or so I discovered.

Ah, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Some weeks ago I was told that Beamer Conservation Area in Grimsby was basically the spring equivalent of Hawk Cliff in fall, where migrating hawks are sort of funneled over/around the lake in great numbers. Obviously, this was of interest to me, so I and my trusty traveling companion watched the weather and selected this past Sunday as a good day to go out and enjoy the spring sunshine, and perhaps see some hawks in the process.

We stopped at Windermere Basin near the Burlington Skyway on the way, since I had heard tell of waterbirds concentrating there recently, and since it really was on the way. Sadly, it was mostly still iced over, and the few groups of birds that were present were practically out of binocular range. I could have gone and gotten the scope from the car, I suppose, but we were being stared at by a bunch of fishermen (yes, fishermen, on the industrial section of the Hamilton waterfront at the end of March, I don't get it either) and I didn't feel like becoming even more of a spectacle.  Besides, it was supposed to be a short stop, not a prolonged exercise in trying to figure out gulls.

In retrospect, I probably should have put in a little more effort. Looking at my (admittedly terrible) photos after the fact, I identified 10+ Ruddy Ducks, a Snow Goose, Bufflehead, American Coot, scaups, a Northern Shoveler, and three (possibly four) different gulls that I can't really identify except to know that they look different from each other (most are likely Ring-billed, so that makes the huge ones Great Black-backed? Plus one that looked like it had a black head, also likely some Herring in there somewhere).


                 Believe it or not, this is one of the better pics.

Undeterred, we packed ourselves back into the car and headed on to Grimsby. After a quick stop at the conveniently-located service centre right at the appropriate exit, we pulled into Beamer, strapped on our binoculars and our rubber boots, and headed in to see some hawks.

I think we might have seen two Red-tailed.  Oh, and the same four Turkey Vultures that kept circling around the viewing platform area (I'm convinced it was the same four, taunting us). The official hawkwatchers mentioned a Peregrine Falcon that, of course, waited until we had left on a short walk out to the lookout before it deigned to show up, so we missed that one.

The explanation that was offered is that despite the gloriously sunny morning we'd experienced, across the lake the day had started out cloudy. So the hawks had basically all woken up and said "nope!" and stayed put for the day, leaving us watching empty skies.

It was still a nice day for a drive, though, so I don't regret going. If nothing else, it gave me opportunity for my first Timmy's ice capp of the year.  Mmm.

The Eyes Have It

This year I noticed quite a few of my feeder finches with eye disease, mainly the House Finches of course but also a few of the Goldfinches. I'd never really noticed it in my previous years of feeding at this location, but I suppose with the extreme cold this winter it might make sense... if the birds were forced to roost in constant close proximity to keep warm, maybe in larger numbers than usual, then it would have been far easier for the bacteria to spread.

Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on how you think about it, I noticed the number of infected birds (and the number of House Finches in general) declined sharply after one of those mid-winter cold snaps, so I expect that a lot of the weakened birds didn't survive. The couple of House Finches that have returned to my feeders recently appear to have healthy eyes, as do all of the Goldfinches I've checked recently. I'll keep cleaning my feeders on the accelerated schedule for a while, though, just in case.

Admitting Defeat

Yeah, that whole "20 different eBird hotspots in a month" challenge isn't going to happen for me.  I should probably have known that I would exhaust all of my 'easy' spots very quickly, and then run into the problem where my other usually reliable spots would have limited access this time of year, or just... not really be worth the trip.  I wish this particular challenge had happened a month or two from now when all of those forest tracts with the snowed-in parking lots would be open and full of warblers, and the little ponds along the roadsides would actually be thawed out.

So I am conceding, and will go back to walking some local trails along the river until such time as winter finally releases its grasp for good, and migration kicks into high gear.

Today I went back out to Crane Park, where I got my first Great Blue Heron of the year, and finally found a few of the Hooded Mergansers that the locals have been mentioning.  The hoodies were all playing shy and keeping their crests slicked down, which made them look a little goofy.

The Birds Are Back In Town

I think migration has officially begun!  I spotted a Coot on the Speed River today, and a few Common Grackles in various places a few days ago.



My front garden certainly thinks it's spring; the daffodils are already starting to peek up where the snow is off.