Wednesday 30 April 2014

A New Conservation Area and Birding Site....Now Accessible

There is a new conservation area which has been in the works these last few months.....the Keith McLean Conservation Lands, and it is just a short distance outside of Rondeau Provincial Park.



Keith McLean was a farmer and conservationist, who spent his entire life at this location. My wife and I, shortly after we were married, lived immediately across the road from Keith for more than 5 years and knew him quite well. He was very community minded, and extremely generous. He didn't have any heirs, and when he died in the fall of 2012, he left his property to the St. Clair Region Conservation Authority (SCRCA). This property is over 300 acres (121 ha). It has been farmed, and in fact is predominantly farmland even to this day. However over the years, some was retained in wetland and woodland while other sections were planted into trees and tallgrass prairie. His lotus ponds were a local point of interest, and Keith welcomed everyone to stop in and view them.

In addition to the land itself, Keith left some financial support to SCRCA in order to manage this land, with the eventual hope that much of it would be restored to nature. He wished above all that these lands would be open to the public, and so they are. There is a bit of a trail system that follows farm lanes and other areas, which go by or through some of the habitats that were retained or created, as shown in some of the following images.

A viewing tower adjacent to the lotus ponds, and also overlooking some of the wetland. The next two images show part of the wetland as viewed from the tower. Being so close to Rondeau, and more or less at the head of Rondeau Bay, what birds might be found here in the future? It looks like a great spot to attract White-faced or Glossy Ibis, or a Tri-coloured Heron, Snowy Egret, etc. Maybe the agricultural fields will have the Rondeau area's first Smith's Longspur! But until that happens, it will be a great place for rails and other marsh birds. I got a brief glimpse of a Virginia Rail here today.



The next image is also taken from the observation tower, looking in the opposite direction across some of the lotus ponds towards the house.


So if you are in the area, be sure to check it out. Work is currently going on at the house as it is being prepared for a property manager.

There is a different diversity of habitats than what Rondeau has to offer, so the birds may offer some greater diversity as well. Also the tallgrass prairies will be in fabulous colour in mid-summer but grassland birds are likely to be found here before then. And it may be a worthwhile location to view migrating raptors in the fall.

Whatever the season, be sure to enjoy the generosity that Keith left for us!

Immediately adjacent to the Keith McLean Conservation Lands is wetland and terrestrial land that was left to the SCRCA by the brother and sister Les and Melba Bates, who both passed away several years ago. These lands are not accessible to the public but visible from the adjacent road/causeway, however.


I spent a bit of time at Rondeau while I was in the area. Due to the light drizzle, bird activity and song was not plentiful, and I didn't see any other birders. However along the Spicebush Trail, I noted several Palm Warblers and a single Nashville Warbler as well as a Blue-headed Vireo and lots of White-throated Sparrows and a couple of Swamp Sparrows. There were more wildflowers out also.....Dutchman's Breeches, below, are coming out nicely.






Monday 28 April 2014

Rondeau on the last Sunday of April

Yesterday (Sunday) was another great day of weather for hiking......not so great for seeing lots of birds. The Ontario Field Ornithologist's group had its annual late April trip, and the ~30 participants reported seeing 79 species which included a trip to the Blenheim Sewage Lagoon. The trails of Rondeau are getting busier with birders as the days go by, and with the decent weather, birders expect to see lots of birds. But the incessant east or northeasterly winds do not bode well for many birds to interrupt their northward migration to stop in at Rondeau. Hopefully that may change in the next couple of days. I know I've said that before, but one has to be optimistic!

As much as I like seeing lots of birds, and rare ones too, I enjoy just being out and taking whatever comes along. It may be the usual species, the not-so-popular species, the wildflowers, fungi, insects, herps (collectively reptiles and amphibians) or mammals. Or the behaviour that some of these species exhibit. Or the diversity of shapes and colours that the natural world has in abundance. And if I can capture some of this by camera, so much the better.

I prefer the quieter trails, where wildlife is more likely to be present, or at least not as likely to be put off by numerous or noisy people. Some trails and some parks get so busy that you feel like you are shuffling along in a grocery checkout line!

On this past Sunday, the South Point Trail looked quite busy. So I parked at the Visitor Centre just as many more vehicles were arriving, grabbed my camera gear and headed off....not on a trail, but westward on Gardiner Ave, crossing the same sloughs that the Tuliptree Trail crosses, then north on the closed (to vehicles) section of Rondeau Road, east on Bennett Ave, then south on the closed section of Harrison Trail, back to the Visitor Centre. During that hike of approximately 6 kilometres, I saw 4 cyclists and two joggers, and not a single other birder.

I came across two male Hairy Woodpeckers displaying and trying to establish ownership of a bit of forest territory.


Hairy Woodpeckers, at least in southern Ontario, seem to be on a bit of a decline in the last couple of decades. I attribute it to an increase in the number of Red-bellied Woodpeckers which, up until the 1970s, was an exceedingly rare species here, but is now more widespread and abundant than Hairy W/p.

As I stood motionless along the road at the edge of a slough, a pair of Canada Geese swam up to within 15 metres of me, and much too close for my telephoto lens. I wish Wood Ducks were so tolerant!

A little further along, a single Turkey Vulture was perched high in a dead oak tree with its massive open branching.


It must have been there for awhile, for as I was walking past, it must have felt the urge for its morning bowel movement. Fortunately I was a little beyond its range :-)


I saw the usual array of kinglets, creepers, Hermit Thrushes and Rusty Blackbirds. I heard the tremolo trumpeting call of one or more Sandhill Cranes off to the southwest in the marsh. And I had a brief glimpse of my first of year Swainson's Thrush.

By the time I got back to the Visitor Centre, the crowds had subsided, so I ventured onto the Tuliptree Trail. Some hikers were well ahead of me, but in my choice to amble slowly and watch carefully, I never caught up to them, and no one else came along in the hour or so I spent on the trail. Birds were few....a Wood Thrush had been seen by one or more parties earlier in the day, but I never caught up to it. A Winter Wren was there, in its usual spot. A small number of Rusty Blackbirds continued to forage at the edge of the larger sloughs. And the nesting Canada Goose (photo posted in previous post) was incubating its eggs, neck outstretched and trying to look as inconspicuous as possible. From along the northwesterly boardwalk, I glimpsed some movement at the water's edge. It looked at first like a muskrat, but muskrats are not often found in that habitat. A closer look, and I was surprised to see a Mink!


I watched it for about 10 minutes as the lone observer......no one else was within earshot or viewing distance, so by moving quietly, I was able to capture a few shots. It was heading in the general direction of where the Canada Goose was nesting, and had the Mink gotten a whiff of the delicacy that was available, there would have been no end to the commotion! However the weasel got close enough to me to realize that it didn't have the slough environment to itself, and so it made an about face and headed back in the general direction it came from.

Mink are quite capable swimmers, and can dive underwater for short distances. On occasion instead of climbing onto or going around a tree root, it chose to dive under it.



Just past the northwesterly boardwalk, I encountered a male Brown-headed Cowbird. This species is not particularly unusual, in general, but I was a bit surprised to see it so far from the entrance to the trail. They are generally considered an edge or open habitat species. The place where I saw it would be considered, in the ecological scheme of things, in what is known as 'interior forest', which is typically forest that is at least 100 metres from the edge, and relatively safe from edge species. Cowbirds are, of course, notorious for not building their own nests, but instead lay their eggs in the nests of other birds whose eggs are more or less a similar size. The young cowbird usually hatches a little sooner than the young of the host species, and will get all the food that the adults bring. A nest that successfully raises a cowbird will have no surviving offspring of the host species. This is a fascinating topic that could involve a lot of discussion, which I won't take time to go into on this post. Suffice to say that normally forest interior bird species such as Red-eyed Vireos and Acadian Flycatchers are relatively safe from the parasitic behaviour exhibited by cowbirds. But if cowbirds do intrude into interior forest habitat, then those other species are at some risk.

On the way to the north end of Rondeau, I stopped in at McArthur's cottage to see if the Yellow-throated Warbler was around. I had stopped earlier in the day (and week) as well, but on all occasions, although there was lots of bird activity of the usual species, no Yellow-throated Warbler appeared. But Common Grackle, Red-winged Blackbird, Chipping Sparrow, Song Sparrow, American Goldfinch, both nuthatch species, Blue Jay, Downy Woodpecker, Red-bellied Woodpecker and Mourning Dove were all coming and going, gorging on the available seed. A single American Tree Sparrow seemed a little late, but given the late arrival of spring, maybe not so much!



Sure they are all relatively common species, but are interesting in their own right.

I next stopped at the north end of Harrison Trail. I had White-eyed Vireo here a couple of days ago, and it was reported again earlier today. But unless it is singing, it can be quite difficult to detect as it flits furtively through the shrubbery.

I noticed some raptors moving, and photographed this adult Red-tailed Hawk.


At the log pond, all was quiet except for a single Blue-headed Vireo busily feeding in a fully flowering willow tree on the far side of the pond. Too far for any photos, but nice to see it as the first one of the year for me.

An adult Cooper's Hawk was being harassed by Blue Jays.....it likely has a nest nearby, but I didn't detect it.


A brief stop at the Spicebush Trail led to long chats with several birders I knew. One of them showed me a photo of a Baltimore Oriole which had appeared at his feeder earlier in the day just north of the park. In the time we spent in the parking area, there wasn't much bird activity, and those coming off the trail confirmed the quiet, so with only the occasional Hermit Thrush and a brief appearance of a Pileated Woodpecker, complete with its drum-roll and distinctive vocalizations, I decided to go elsewhere.

The final stop for the day was the north end of the Marsh Trail. There was less wind, and lots of light, which had its advantages for insect and bird activity and hopefully photography. Song Sparrows and kinglets were about all the land birds I could muster, so I spent some time being entertained by Common Terns. There were several of them going back and forth over the quiet, shallow water along the trail, and every once in awhile they would go into hovering mode, then make a quick plunge after a minnow. They were mostly back-lit, however, making for some challenging photography. I will have to make the attempt to be here much earlier in the day under similar conditions.


The lower photo was taken just after the tern emerged from a plunge....you may be able to see some water droplets trailing behind, as it shook itself before moving on.

One cannot go along the Marsh Trail anymore without being distracted by the ever increasing number of wind turbines across the bay. They are supposed to be a minimum of 500 metres from either the lake or bay edge, and in all likelihood they are. However they are such huge, imposing structures that they dominate the landscape. Again, the lighting wasn't great, so this photo only shows a few, back-lit ones taken with the equivalent of a 700mm telephoto lens. But the previous time I was out, from the lowest level of the observation tower I made a count and, looking from east to west, could see parts of as many as 180 turbines across the bay!


Friday 25 April 2014

Friend day, and a few birds also

Thursday was another gorgeous spring day....lots of sunshine, light winds and mild temperatures. Did you see the sun dog the evening before? A sun dog is created by the refraction of the sunlight through ice crystals that are present in the high cirrus clouds. The side closest to the sun is reddish/orange in colour, changing to yellow and eventually bluish before turning white at the side farthest from the sun.



Unfortunately there weren't a lot of birds around. They must be passing right over head on their way north, as I have heard reports of more warblers being seen north of here than what is being reported at Rondeau. We need a few storms from the southwest to force the migrants down. Maybe the rain of today will change things.

Nonetheless, there were a few birds to be enjoyed. While chatting with some friends at the Visitor Centre, someone came along with a photo of a White-eyed Vireo that he had taken a few hours earlier along the south side of the maintenance compound. So off we went....it is the first one I have heard of anywhere in southern Ontario this year.



This species is notorious for spending most of its time in thick shrubbery, and this one was no exception. Sometimes it disappeared for awhile, and we were only able to locate it when it sang its very distinctive song. It was often in the shadows of the cedar hedge, but persistence paid off, and eventually I was able to get some photos through more open branches. It is an uncommon but regular bird at Rondeau. Interestingly, the first nesting record of White-eyed Vireo in Canada occurred less than a kilometre north of Rondeau in 1971. It has nested on occasion in the park since that time.

The Tuliptree and Spicebush Trails were quiet, but there were a number of friends and acquaintances who were around, so I actually spent much more time visiting than birding! And I don't think I missed any birds either. The social aspect of birding is definitely a plus, especially when birds aren't plentiful. I spent a fair bit of time chatting with various park staff over the course of the day as well.

An Eastern Gartersnake slithered by. The previous post showed a Ribbon Snake. This photo shows some of the subtle differences between the two species, if you compare the two photos.

As the afternoon wore on and people became fewer, I decided to try the Marsh Trail, which I hadn't been very far along on this year. It was great to note that finally all the snow has disappeared off the trail, other than a couple of small patches that were no trouble at all.There were lots of White-throated Sparrows along the trail, and the occasional Hermit Thrush. Leopard Frogs were 'snoring' in the wetland.

I went as far as the observation tower. There were ducks out on the bay, especially Gadwall and Bufflehead. A few muskrats were busy along the marsh edges doing what muskrats do. Hopefully they won't end up at the Visitor Centre pond and destroy the liner like one did before!


Right near the beginning of the observation tower boardwalk was some bird activity. Both Palm Warbler and Yellow-rumped Warbler were busily feeding in some willow trees.

Palm Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler

And nearby in the dogwoods, a pair of Blue-gray Gnatcatchers were busily feeding.


Tuesday 22 April 2014

Three grebes and a....

few shorebirds. Also birds are nesting and wildflowers are appearing!

On my way to Rondeau on Monday morning, I stopped in at the Blenheim Sewage Lagoons, hoping to find the Eared Grebe which was seen on Sunday. In Pond 1, was a Pied-billed Grebe, plus Spotted Sandpiper and lots of Ruddy Ducks, Northern Shovelers, Blue-winged Teal and Bufflehead. In Pond 5, a Horned Grebe in well-developed breeding plumage was there, along with the same mix of ducks. And then I noted the Eared Grebe. While binoculars were adequate, I was glad for the 'scope to appreciate these birds. At one point I had both Horned and Eared simultaneously in the field of view, which was a nice comparison, but from a distance. I did get a record shot of the Eared as shown. Even at 700mm, it is heavily cropped.


Just to make it easier to appreciate, I am posting this image of an Eared Grebe I shot at these same lagoons on Apr 26, 2011, where it was much closer!



In the sprinkler cell was a great many shorebirds. Pectoral Sandpiper and Dunlin were the main ones. A single Greater Yellowlegs and 5 Lesser Yellowlegs were present, plus the usual Killdeer. There were likely in excess of 600 shorebirds altogether.

Greater Yellowlegs

Lesser Yellowlegs

Pectoral Sandpiper
On occasion, something spooked the shorebirds, sending them wheeling around in concert before settling back down to the water. I looked for a passing raptor as the cause, but sometimes it seems that there doesn't need to be an obvious reason for them to take flight. Perhaps they are practicing their evasive techniques in case a predatory raptor does show up?

Pectoral Sandpiper and Dunlin
The Dunlin have a white wing-stripe, the Pectoral Sandpipers do not.

Here is a little quiz for you. I am periodically questioned about counting the numbers of birds, and especially when there are large numbers or flocks of birds in flight. The added challenge is that when birds are in motion, you can't accurately count them all. Sometimes you only have a couple of seconds to come up with a number. So take a couple of seconds and make an estimate of how many birds you think are in the flock below. 100? 133? 150? 176? 200? Or? The answer is at the bottom of this post.



It was a very pleasant way to spend an hour and a half. I had the lagoons to myself, other than the birds. Male Savannah Sparrows were scattered on the tops of hay bales serenading their mates. Waterfowl were flying about from time to time, and an immature Lesser Black-backed Gull flew by, heading for the Ridge Landfill a couple of kilometres to the west.

Blue-winged Teal

Northern Shoveler

A brief stop at Shrewsbury before heading to Rondeau didn't have a lot of action, but I noticed a Killdeer sitting in a grassy areas. It appeared to be on a nest.

Usually as soon as one approaches a Killdeer nest, the bird will get up and run away, and if you get too close, it will try and distract the intruder with its broken wing act. This bird sat tight until I got almost right to the nest before doing its distraction display, which leads me to believe the eggs are very close to hatching.



Below is the next generation of Killdeer, if all goes well. The nest is quite well camouflaged, although less so in this grassy patch than if it were on, for example, on a gravelly beach. 



I made it to Rondeau. The South Point Trail had a few of the usual birds as well as a couple of Red Admiral and Eastern Comma butterflies, but the most interesting thing was a Ribbon Snake. It is a snake of wet woods and is officially a Species At Risk. Although it looks very much like an Eastern Garter Snake, it has brighter yellow stripes, a bit of chestnut colour along the lower side, and a small white vertical patch right in front of the eye.



A walk around the Tuliptree Trail produced an adult Bald Eagle soaring overhead, and I heard one or more Sandhill Cranes trumpeting out in the marsh. At the extreme southwestern boardwalk, I had Winter Wren singing. It has an impressive, musical song, and when one hears it, it is hard to believe this little songster can produce such music! It popped out in the open briefly. Generally it breeds farther north, but on occasion it will nest at Rondeau. I had the first confirmed nesting of this species at Rondeau in the early 1980s, in an upturned tree root only a few metres from where I saw this bird this day.

Also on TTT, a Canada Goose had found a satisfactory nesting platform on top of this mossy tree root.



Along Gardiner Avenue, I came across Coltsfoot, one of the earliest spring wildflowers, although it is not native. The leaves do not appear until it has finished flowering.



A Mourning Cloak butterfly was flitting about, but shortly after it landed on this tree trunk, a Yellow-rumped Warbler came by and startled it.


The Spicebush Trail and Bennett Ave had a great show of wildflowers. Wildflowers have been slow to show this spring due to the never-ending winter, but they are finally waking up, and have really come on nicely in the last few warmer days. Hepaticas, both sharp-lobed and round-lobed species, are the most abundant. Their leaves are not well developed at this early stage of flowering, so it is tricky to tell one from the other. These photos show it emerging from the leaf litter on the left, and from a very rotting log on the right.





































Cut-leaved Toothwort, below, is just beginning. It is named for its extremely dissected leaves. Some other toothwort species will be showing up soon.



Bloodroot, named for the reddish sap of the roots, is another early species. When it first appears, the leaves are very tightly wrapped around the stem, but after a few days the leaves will be more obvious as shown in the lower photo.








And so the flowering season, and the nesting season is well underway!



Answer to bird quiz: I find that almost everyone underestimates the number, myself included. The number of shorebirds that are all or in part showing up in this image is ~300. Did you come up with that number? Post a comment here, or send your thoughts to me privately or anonymously if you wish.