Yesterday I spent the full day in the Pelee area. A few highlights, including some good butterflies at the Couture Dyke. I had a Cloudless Sulfur, my second this year, as well as 31 Bronze Coppers (I've never seen them before in southern Ontario!). Some were mating and so naturally I took some voyeuristic photos.
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| Bronze Coppers - Hillman Marsh |
Earlier that morning, while doing a lakewatch with Alan, the most exciting bird was this single juv. Bonaparte's Gull on the beach. It was that slow!
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| Bonaparte`s Gull - Point Pelee NP |
The American Avocet was present yesterday as well as today when I checked in the late afternoon. I ran into Dwayne Murphy here and he was happy to see it. A photo with the real camera this time:
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| American Avocet - Hillman Marsh |
Last night I checked out the egret roost at Holiday Beach to see what was going on. Kory Renaud, Chip Weseloh, Clive Hodder, Bev Wannick, and Jeremy and Nadia (didn't catch their last names) were also there. The egret numbers were way down, and unfortunately there were no rare species present with the group. I still need all 3 ibises for the year!
Kory and Sarah were kind to offer their place for me to stay, and then this morning Kory and I headed in to Point Pelee for a few hours. It was painfully slow for birds and I think we identified about 4 species of warblers. Fortunately, one of them was a Connecticut - a first year bird that walked around on a branch only a few feet from us after we pished it in.
From there the rains came in so I took it easy for a few hours/napped/ate lunch etc. I went out for a bit this afternoon, but didn't really see anything that interesting. This evening, Kory and I met up at the Pelee marsh and we took his canoe around for a few hours. There are some mudflats throughout the marsh and they are used by shorebirds. These areas aren't checked frequently enough and good shorebirds do show up. Especially appealing about the area is the ease in which one can photograph them! They seem to be way less wary of people in canoes/kayaks compared to on foot. Out of the photos I took, this one I was most happy with.
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| American Golden-plover - Point Pelee marsh |
It was beautiful out in the marsh - 20 degrees, sunny, and perfectly calm. Several Soras were seen as were about 10 species of shorebirds. A beautiful end to the day! Tomorrow looks ideal for a huge hawk flight, so I think I will park myself down at Seacliffe and pray for a Swainson's Hawk.
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