It is amazing how unreliable birds can be at times, we have had field trips, lectures, art and photo shows, we have even had beers named for the events and to cap it all off we have the faithful who turn up every Wednesday to count them. What do they do, they don’t show up for the party provided for them. This was the case this week when panic had set in among the counters, here we were three parts through our count and we hadn’t got a Swan of any species. Luckily at Dougans Flats a pair of Trumpeters were way out in the field among a large throng of Canada Geese. That was it with the Dock Road shut up for this solemn day we had a grand total of 2 Swans.
Eight counters turned up to start the day and another two stragglers met us at A&W.
Before we had gone through Lakes Road, Somenos and Quist’s Farm we had added over 500 Canada Geese and a few Raptors. This week saw good numbers of Red-tailed Hawks ” photo thanks to Zan”, a Peregrine Falcon and a very fast Coopers Hawk who zipped in after some Starlings and Blackbirds at the corner of TCH and Hwy 18.
At Quist’s farm i had no sooner got out of the vehicle to check the ducks when several motor bikes roared down the Hwy and a Northern Harrier flew up the railroad, one of us put all the ducks and geese into flight never to be seen again.
There were some very accommodating Bald Eagles at the foot of Boy’s Road which helped get our total of eagles up above last weeks numbers, we will surely be getting many more in the weeks to come.
You know your having a bad week when the number of Ruby-crowned Kinglets is three times that of the swans and the same with Red-tailed Hawks who tripled our swan count.
I know I sometimes mention some of the other people in our group along with their little foibles but sadly one of our group has a problem, well three actually I being one of them, we tend to home in on discarded returnable cans and bottles, but what took place this week sadly disturbed me, one of our party picked up one of those Vodka cooler things Palm Bay which was half full and started to drink it and it was not long before she was totally sloshed and pointing out all sorts of rarities. I do hope she gets help before she misidentifies to many birds.
In among the Geese at Dougans Flats was a Cackling Goose or two, but to far away to record more than one but we doubled our number with a single bird once again at Jim’s Pond, here we enjoyed good looks at a Wilson’s Snipe and a couple of Eurasian-Collared Doves. A Great Blue Heron sat on a fence watching us with fixed eyes, he could have been counting us.
This was our day, not the best, but the weather which once again treated us to a sunny Wednesday.
Eric and Kurlene did a wonderful job of driving and with a little incentive from me about a certain Sparrow species got us around the route in good time for me to have my afternoon nap. Big thanks to who was once my good friend and a good sport Christina for giving me some fun to write about.
Lastly we should give a thought to all those men and women who gave up so much so that we could enjoy what we do today, thankyou.
Derrick