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.