This week has felt almost like spring with temperatures averaging around 3 degrees, feeling like 5 degrees with sunshine on the majority of the days. Surprisingly, these warm temperatures will continue into next week as well, making for quite a warm February.
Next week we'll start to experience winds from the S/SW, hopefully blowing up some goodies from the states like a Ross's Goose. In the coming days/weeks, short distance migrants like Killdeer, American Woodcock and dabbling ducks (hopefully a Eurasian Wigeon) will start appearing and before we know it, hawkwatching season will be in full swing! Really looking forward to it!
During this past school week (Feb 7-10) I've mainly just been walking the local trails and checking the ponds for different geese and ducks. Almost all the times I go out, I will see the same things I see everyday, but when checking constantly, you're bound to see something that will surprise you (a rare or interesting bird).
If I could describe my weekend with two words, I would use productive & eventful; it was honestly a blast!
My Saturday started with participating in the West End Lake Ontario waterfowl count (WELO), counting all the ducks I could see in an assigned area. Conditions on the lake were absolutely perfect for today as I could see incredibly far out with next to no heat shimmer. This allowed me to spot several Horned Grebes and a single Red-necked Grebe swimming within their own groups.
After that, I walked around Bronte Creek Provincial Park (the campground side) looking for winter finches, owls, and sparrows. While walking through the tall grasses in the fields north of the park, I stumbled upon a freshly dead White-tailed Deer carcass. This freaked me out so I tried to leave that area as fast as I could.
Sunday was warm & sunny with a very subtle breeze. Because of this nice weather, my dad and I decided to head out to Burloak Woods to find an Eastern Screech-Owl that prefers to sit outside of its tree hole on these nice and sunny days. We arrived and there it was, just chilling there gaining some Vitamin D!
Then we drove over to LaSalle Park to look at ducks and maybe find the Pacific Loon or Great Cormorant again. There wasn't much activity going on but that's probably because I stayed put in one spot for an hour. Looking back at it now, I definitely should have tried for the Pileated Woodpecker that has been somewhere in those woods for at least a week now. Pileated Woodpecker certainly isn't a rare bird in the HSA (Code 2), but it is always good to get it out of the way and it would help me reach my goal of seeing 100 species by the end of February.
Having time to kill around noon, we drove though Dundas looking for Turkey Vultures and then up the escarpment to check the Dyment's Farm area for Lapland Longspur. The very first bird we saw on the escarpment was a pair of Turkey Vultures soaring in circles! These are likely residents from Dundas rather than early migrants. Last year I visited Dyment's Farm in the winter when there was snow on the ground and saw a Lapland Longspur with many Snow Buntings and Horned Lark. This time was much different, all the snow on the fields had melted and we could only locate a few Horned Larks. We even had some sort of wasp/buzzing bee whiz by us, strange.
In the evening, after putting it off for two weeks, my mom and I finally made the journey to Haldimand to search for Short-eared Owls. Finding time wasn't the only reason we were putting it off, it was also being there with the right weather. This evening was calm with little to no clouds, perfect conditions for owls being out and about. Short-eared Owls like hunting on these nice sunny and calm days where they can freely glide and fly around without being pushed around by the wind. Also along this stretch of road, a few Rough-legged Hawks had been reported.
Arriving just before sunset along the road where the owls were reported earlier, we found a couple of Red-tailed Hawks perched in trees but that seemed to be it. We thought to try our luck on the road running parallel to this one, just a few hundred yards south. Not long after, I spot a raptor loafing just above the ground, lift my binoculars to my eyes and see a nice "Gray Ghost" male Northern Harrier! We find a safe place to put off on the side of the road and wait for it to pop back up from the field it had just flown down into. Just behind me is a little stream with some shrubs that contained some sparrows, cardinals, and chickadees. That group kept me occupied for a while.
Not long after, a female Northern Harrier flies right over our car, then a Rough-legged Hawk from the treeline, then a Short-eared Owl materializes from the grassy field! Before we know it, five Short-eared Owls, four Northern Harriers, two Red-tailed Hawks, and the Rough-legged Hawk are all flying in the same field. What a spectacle that was, it was like a raptor snowglobe. That evening was just magical watching all the raptors flying around the vast fields during golden hour and running into some great local HSA birders. That was actually my first time 'fully' seeing a Short-eared Owl. Two years ago, I observed just the wing of one fly into the headlights. Thankfully the Short-eared Owls showed themselves quite early in the evening as sometimes they only come out at dusk because we arrived home in Oakville with just two minutes to spare until the Superbowl started! That brings things to a wrap, adding 4 new species to the HSA big year.
HSA Year List: 98
Recent Rare Bird Sightings: (Bold text represents species that I have yet to add to the HSA Big Year)
Snow Goose - One near Christie Lake CA (Jackson Hudecki; Feb 11)
Bohiemian Waxwing - A group of 16 in a private yard in Flamborough (Rowan Keunen; Feb 8)
King Eider - Female continuing off Fifty Point
Great Cormorant - Recently seen again on the wave tower
That must have been awesome, congrats on the cool sightings
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