Tuesday, February 18, 2020

A Surprise Visitor: Two Days Birding in SW Ontario

I had an unexpected visitor over the weekend of Feb 8-9. My brother Bruce texted Saturday morning from the Pearson International Airport in Toronto saying that his connecting flight to St. John's had been cancelled and that he'd been rebooked on a flight Monday morning. ... Let's do a couple of days of birding in Southern Ontario! I knew we couldn't possibly top the two weeks he'd just spent birding in the Falklands, Antarctica and southern South America, but we could still make a good finish to his once-in-a-lifetime trip.

Day One:
On Saturday, we focused on Hamilton Harbour/Burlington Bay, where there are loads and loads of wintering ducks. On the way to LaSalle Marina, we made a slight detour to see the red-morph Eastern Screech Owl. Lucky for us, it was showing. It's so nice to have that owl around in an easy-to-see spot. At LaSalle Marina, there were many species, including 100+ Canvasback, ~40 Ring-necked Ducks, Common Goldeneye, White-winged Scoter, Bufflehead, Long-tailed Duck, and the usual group of Trumpeter Swans. Photo ops weren't very good, but I know Bruce was happy with seeing the species, especially the Canvasbacks.

Red-morph Eastern Screech Owl: A long-time resident in Burlington
After LaSalle, we headed over to the other side of the bay to Pier 4 and Pier 8 in Hamilton looking for gulls and ducks. At Pier 4, there were a couple of Glaucous Gulls hanging with some Herring Gulls. Someday, I'll get more excited about gulls! At Pier 8, we found more ducks: Common Goldeneye, Greater Scaup, American Coot, White-winged Scoter, and some very talkative Long-tailed Ducks eating zebra mussels.

Long-tailed Duck eating a Zebra Mussel

Day Two:
Sunday was the real birding day! Knowing there was a few thousand Sandhill Cranes and several hundred Tundra Swans wintering at Long Point, that was the easy choice for the day's destination. It even beat out a trip to see the Northern Hawk Owl up in Schomberg, mainly because we'd see many more species at Long Point. The weather forecast was pretty mixed: mainly cloudy with snow showers, possible freezing drizzle, morning fog, and occasional sunny periods! Perfect!

On the 85-minute drive from Hamilton to Long Point, we counted Red-tailed Hawks. I predicted we would get at least 12 before arriving at Long Point. We ended up with 15 or 16. Red-tailed Hawks are very common in southern Ontario 12 months of the year.

As we were approaching the corn fields where the Sandhills have been gathering, we spied a very dark raptor perched in a tree right beside the road. At first we thought it was the dark-morph Red-tailed Hawk that had been seen in the area, but upon closer inspection of photos, we discovered that it was a dark-morph Rough-legged Hawk. I only managed record shots, but still a nice bird to see.

Dark-morph Rough-legged Hawk
As we turned onto Lakeshore Road, where the Sandhills have been showing quite close to the road, we saw hundreds flying from Big Creek marsh into the corn fields for feeding. We quickly pulled into a small parking area and jumped out to watch and photograph the event. The lighting was spectacular, with thin clouds almost revealing blue sky and the fresh snow lighting up the birds' undersides! The options for flight shots were numerous, and all to the soundtrack of hundreds of calling Sandhill Cranes. It was one of those moments you always hope for!

Sandhill Crane: The lighting made the wingtips turn a slight bronze colour
Sandhill Cranes
Sandhill Cranes: Just some of the many flying over us
Sandhill Crane: My favourite photo from the trip 

Other Birds Too!
In addition to the scads of Sandhill Cranes, we saw several other species, including hundreds of Tundra Swans, thousands of Redhead Ducks, several Bald Eagles, a few Northern Harriers, a Pileated Woodpecker, a Red-bellied Woodpecker, Horned Larks, a Lapland Longspur, and even a Great Blue Heron.

Some of the thousands of Redhead Ducks and Tundra Swans. Note the Bald Eagle in the right corner, waiting for an an opportunity to grab some lunch. 

Just some of the hundreds of Tundra Swans we saw.
All-in-all ...
So, all-in-all it was a great two days of birding with my brother. Sunday at Long Point was a standout day with so many birds to see and photograph.

To end this post, here's a snap of me taken by Bruce at LaSalle ... smiling with my new lens!
Me with the new lens, all wrapped in camo! 





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