It's been a while...

Ok, so I know I haven't posted anything birding-related for a while, so here it is, a summary of my month and a week since the last post. First off, I've added 55 species to the year list, bringing it up to 122 - a reasonable total for this time of year although I'm still missing a ton of birds that are around. There hasn't been much out of the ordinary - last ski day was April 4, on which I found my FOS Red-shouldered Hawk - always a nice bird up here. I went to Sudbury for Easter, and on the way there managed to find 2 Ross's Geese and a Cackling Goose, both of which used to be super rare in the area but are annual now. The day after my return I went out and found another Ross's Goose, along with a lot of waterfowl. The first shorebirds have returned, with Greater Yellowlegs and Woodcock on the list. I managed to shatter my record numbers of Pintails and Green-winged Teal in a field, with 120+ and 60+, respectively. On April 19, saw 11 breeding-plumaged male Lapland Longspurs, something you don't see too often. Yesterday I went to Whitefish Point for the first time this year, and we had a good day despite the rain and constant NW wind - basically the worst conditions for spring birding. We managed 76 species by the end, with 16 year birds and 2 new for my SSM list! The new ones were American Avocet (2nd point record) and Spruce Grouse (FINALLY!!!!). I also added Short-eared Owl to my WPBO list, one that has been missing for too long. Went out today to look for a yellow-throated warbler, with no success. It probably took off with the cold front yesterday. Managed to add Brewer's Blackbird though. That's it for now - we should be seeing a massive influx of migrants over the next week if the weather cooperates, there are a ton of new species coming in to southern ontario!

Ross's Goose - Desbarats

Mallard - Sudbury

Trumpeter Swan - Sudbury

Hoary Redpoll - Sudbury

Common Redpoll - Sudbury

Short-eared Owl - WPBO

American Avocet - WPBO

Spruce Grouse - Vermillion Rd.

Quiz 5

Congrats to Brendan Fogarty for being the only one to get all 5 birds right on the last one. John Garrett, Tim Hajda, Andrew Spencer, Jason Bojczyk got 4/5, and a few others got 3/5. The correct answer was: top - Purple Finch, Black-capped Chickadee, American Tree Sparrow, mid - Fox Sparrow, bottom - Piping Plover.

This new quiz is a couple of pretty old shots of mine.

Quiz 4 - Hide n' Go Seek

Congrats to Tim Hajda, John Garrett, and Jason T for getting the last quiz. The answer is - Least Sandpiper (top) and Semipalmated Plover (bottom).

This new quiz shouldn't be too hard - if you can find the birds that is! Birds often like to hide in dense brush or camouflage themselves in their habitat - it's good to be able to ID them when you can only see bits and pieces! Also having a sharp eye helps.

Bonus points if you can ID all 5 species present. Yes, there really are 5 different species between the 3 photos!

Quiz 3

First of all, congrats to Andrew Spencer and Tim Hajda for acing the last quiz, and to Chris West for getting 5/8 on the species. Answer: Top Photo: Common Goldeneye (m), Hooded Merganser (m), Common Goldeneye (f), Canvasback (m), Canvasback (f), 3 Common Mergansers (m). Bottom photo: Red-breasted Merganser (m), Lesser Scaup (f), Tufted Duck (m), 2 Lesser Scaup (m), and 4 Bufflehead in the background. The Tufted Duck was a bit of a curveball, I'll admit, but you have to keep on your toes in the field! You never know what might show up.

This week should be a little easier. Good luck! And post those answers if you have them, even if you aren't 100% sure! I've only gotten 2 for each of the last two quizzes.

Photo of the Week

Ok, this is a day late, but I was pretty busy last night with homework and such. I was messing around in Photoshop today trying out some new things, and liked this one. It's a random field in Chippewa County, Michigan. Good spot for Short-eared Owls but they weren't there that night.

I need more answers for that quiz!

Quiz 2

Congrats to John Garrett and Chris West for ID'ing the Downy Woodpecker in the last quiz!

Here are two new ones - as you can tell the theme is duck flocks - ID all the birds in both photos! Good luck!

Photo of the Week 3

This one's of a tree marked as a nest site of the Red-cockaded Woodpecker, in North Carolina. John Fussell showed us them and much more around Croatan National Forest - if you're ever in the area, look him up!

Photo Quiz

Meant to post this yesterday but got caught up with homework and movies with friends. My blog's 1-year anniversary was on the 22nd, and I went skiing - spent almost the whole day in the park learning tricks. This weekend will be the last one for Searchmont this season. On another note, I'm taking an idea from John Garrett and posting a series of quizzes - I'll update them on Tuesdays - I'll give it a week then I'll post the answer. Whoever has the most right at the end of the series wins! You don't actually win anything other than the knowledge that you're good at quizzes though.

I'll start with an easy one. Feel free to leave your answers in the comments section (I won't show them until the week is up)!

Photo of the Week #2

Well, another Thursday, another random photo from my travels! This is Mile 0 of the Trans-Canada Highway, which at a length of 7,821 km is the longest national highway in the world - the midpoint is just north of the Sault!

Bigbying

On the 16th I decided to bike out to the east end to look for some birds that Stan had reported at his feeders. It was -1ºC when I started out, a little chilly to be outside for an hour in just a sweater but the biking helped warm me up. I added 6 new Bigby birds, the best being the two that I went to see - House Finch and Red-bellied Woodpecker, both of which seem to be becoming more regular in the area. The other Bigby birds were both nuthatches, Pileated Woodpecker, and Evening Grosbeak. Yesterday I went up to Searchmont with a couple friends, and it got up to 12ºC! We skied in t-shirts for most of the day, and went waterskiing at the end across a huge puddle that had formed.

Weekend Adventures

Yesterday I met up with Jason T from southern Michigan for an afternoon of birding south of the Sault. We had a decent day with 34 species - 3 of which were lifers for him! Unfortunately, the Hawk Owls decided it'd be a good time to leave, and we didn't find a single one of the three that were here all winter. We did have an unexpected Gray Jay though, along with most of the finches including 2 very nice Hoary Redpolls.

Today I decided to skip out on Searchmont so I could sleep for an extra hour or two and then work on some things. Turned out to be a good plan as my brother wasn't feeling well so they came back early anyway. It was a beautiful day, with temps up to 8ºC!!! After being outside in the backyard for a bit and finding my first Dark-eyed Junco for the year, I decided to bike down to Bellevue to see what was around. It was so warm I only needed a t-shirt and jeans (although most other people were still wearing jackets for some reason...). Anyway, I managed to add 4 year birds and 16 new Bigby birds today (plus the junco) - year birds were Canada Goose, Ring-necked Duck, Bufflehead, and Red-winged Blackbird, bringing my year list up to 65 and Bigby to 33! Spring is here! (hopefully it'll stay this time)

Photo of the Week

I've decided that once a week I'll post a random photo from one of our trips. This one is from Carlsbad Caverns, New Mexico. It's a great place, I'd highly recommend it if you're ever in NM - it's fairly cheap too.

Spring? or not...

Well, about a week ago the weather decided it was going to be warm, and the snow started to melt. The birds started returning and singing - only a few species as is typical for super early spring, but it was still nice. I spent quite a bit of time down at the Locks, and managed to find a Snowy Owl! A new bird for Ontario! Also found some year birds like Peregrine Falcon and Ring-billed Gull. There was quite a bit of activity, with the Rusty Blackbird starting to sing along with Robins, American Tree Sparrows, and the redpolls, goldfinches, siskins, etc. Then I heard about a 2-week old report of a Boreal Owl in the Sault College Woodlot. Now, I'd never even been to the woodlot before, and had no idea how to get around it, let alone where the "conifer plantation" was. Turns out the conifer plantation is a fairly large area - about 4 acres. Since I had no idea on the exact location, I decided to head down the hill to the first part of the plantation that I saw. I found a likely-looking area, and walked off the path and into the thigh-deep snow. I got into the trees, and promptly spooked a rabbit still in full winter gear. I followed it for a few yards, trying to get close enough for a photo. It took off running, as rabbits are prone to do. I looked up to check the tree I was standing beside and - BOREAL OWL!!! It was staring at me with those bright yellow eyes, wondering who was interrupting its nap. So, it took me all of 2 minutes of searching to find this little guy - I got amazingly lucky. Went back the next day with Kirk and after an hour and a half had nothing to show for our efforts but a small pellet from the day before. I was just happy that I found it - this is the first Boreal Owl I've ever seen (although I've heard them calling before).

Now we are back to winter with a huge storm in the last 24 hours. We got a few inches of snow along with rain and ice pellets yesterday evening. Overnight that turned into pure ice on the roads with wind chills below -20ºC. Woke up briefly at 6 a.m. as the house was shaking - turns out the wind was 80+km/h with gusts up to 100km/h causing power outages in some areas (including the hospital!). This continued through the entire day, mixed with blowing snow causing total whiteouts - driving was quite the experience - averaged around 20km/h as you couldn't see a car or the red lights until they were 20 feet in front of you! Of course, living in the Sault, we still had school, but by the end of the day the highways (along with most of the city) were completely shut down and there were multiple accidents.

Boreal Owl! These photos are uncropped!

February...

Probably one of our weirdest months for weather here in the Sault. Lows of around -30ºC (-22ºF) and highs of 6ºC (43ºF) or so have been normal these last few years, and it can be snowy, rainy, cloudy, or sunny - with no two days exactly the same! At least the days are getting longer, and it stays light until after 6 p.m. now!

On the 14th I hitched a ride with John Ralston to see what was around across the river. We had a great day, with 40 species including Northern Hawk, Snowy, and Great Gray Owls!

Northern Hawk Owl

Snowy Owl in Rudyard

Other than that, I haven't been out birding much - although I have been skiing a couple times and managed to land the biggest jump in the park - a 65 foot gap. I have some videos of me and my friends skiing - they haven't been wanting to upload to the internet though.

Year bird #50

As the title says, I got my 50th year bird today in the form of a Horned Grebe on the river. What's a grebe doing in Sault Ste. Marie in February you ask? We're in one of our midwinter thaws, yesterday we tied a record of 6ºC (43ºF) set back in 1966, and it was at least that warm again today. Unfortunately, that means all of our precipitation comes as rain, and the roads have been getting worse by the day. Two Greater Scaup were also brought in with the warm front, along with robins and many Herring Gulls (they disappeared for a few weeks back in January). Searchmont is also having some bad conditions, with the raining and freezing and melting and whatnot. I was up there on the weekend, had my first-ever park sesh - hit the 40 foot jump by the end and landed it no problem. Also managed to find a flock of around 10 Evening Grosbeaks along with the usual siskins, redpolls, etc.

If you're thinking that 6º is cold, think again! It's actually almost uncomfortably warm here - I am quite comfortable in just a t-shirt and jeans. I can't wait for this thaw to be over so the skiing conditions will get better! Also so the roads will improve, they're bumpy as all hell right now and covered in massive puddles.

On another note, all this melting combined with a broken sump-pump caused my basement to flood this morning. I was rudely awoken at 8 a.m. with the news and got to work before I was even awake (I had spare first which is why I was still asleep at 8 a.m.). We got it mostly cleaned up and the plumber came and installed a new pump, so hopefully there will be no more of that nonsense.