On Thursday, Dave Lord reported a possible Black-legged Kittiwake from the Barrie waterfront. Brennan Obermayer followed up on the report and ended up photographing the bird - definitely a kittiwake. It was still being seen on Saturday, so I headed up there for a few hours in the afternoon before watching the Leafs game at David Szmyr's place (which I might add, saw the Leafs lose 1-0 with 10 seconds left in OT...).
I parked and walked north to the marina, and quickly found the kittiwake resting with some Bonaparte's Gulls off the breakwall. A little too distant for good photos, however.
I turned my attention to the masses of Bonaparte's and occasional Little Gulls as they flew around the harbour and along the break-wall, plunge diving for fish. Clouds obscured the sun but it was at my back, providing semi-decent photography conditions. I sat down in the rocks at the base of the break-wall and cracked off a few hundred frames. Due to the low light I had to compensate with ISO to obtain a fast enough shutter speed - this makes the photos appear "noisier". I also was forced to shoot my lens wide open to account for the low light, which decreased the depth of field in the images. It was tough to get a sharp photo with the whole bird in focus, while also maintaining a relatively noise-free image!
 |
| Little Gull - Barrie, ON |
 |
| Little Gull - Barrie, ON |
 |
| Little Gull - Barrie, ON |
In this image are an adult Bonaparte's Gull (top left), adult Little Gull (top right) and juvenile Bonaparte's Gull (bottom right). While most birders know that Little Gulls have striking black underwings, some other easy ID features include the light gray dorsal side of wings without the white and black primary pattern of a Bonaparte's, and the dark, streaked cap.
 |
| Little and Bonaparte's Gulls |
 |
| Little Gull - Barrie, ON |
By positioning myself at the end of the break-wall, I could watch incoming Bonaparte's and Little Gulls as the flew towards me, parallel to the break-wall. I often had about a 10 second window in which the bird was at a good angle and with decent light. If I was lucky, I would catch the bird with the wings extended or in a nice "natural" looking position, but most of the photos turned out with the bird facing the wrong way, or with a wing blocking its head, etc. Overall though I was pretty happy with my first real Little Gull photoshoot. A beautiful bird species, even when lacking the black hood they sport in spring plumage.
 |
| Little Gull - Barrie, ON |
Eventually I noticed that the kittiwake had joined the masses of gulls in the harbour - a great opportunity to have a rare, close look at this species in Ontario. It dwarfed the Bonaparte's Gulls that it was with, but generally acted the same as them.
The bold black "M" pattern on the wings is a distinctive look on a juvenile Black-legged Kittiwake, as is the dark neck collar as shown on the image above.. Adults, an age class rarely seen in Ontario, have normal looking gray wings with small black wingtips.
 |
| juvenile Black-legged Kittiwake - Barrie, ON |
I managed to get a photo of it flying in front of the "City of Barrie Marina" sign.
 |
| juvenile Black-legged Kittiwake - Barrie, ON |
I don't know of any prior reports of this species in Simcoe County before. While Black-legged Kittiwakes are regular but rare fall migrants across the lower Great Lakes and James Bay coast, they rarely are seen elsewhere in the province. I would bet that this individual flew south off of James Bay, as do presumably many of the waterfowl seen at this time of year on Lake Simcoe.
 |
| juvenile Black-legged Kittiwake - Barrie, ON |
Most of the Little Gulls I counted were adults, with 3 second-winter birds and 2 boldly marked juveniles. In total there were at least 18 Little Gulls - a pretty good chunk of the North American population of this species. The wing pattern on a juvenile Little Gull is much stronger than on a juvenile Bonaparte's Gull with more black in the wings in somewhat of an M pattern, and with a differently shaped black tail tip..
 |
| juvenile Little Gull - Barrie, ON |
 |
| juvenile Little Gull - Barrie, ON |
On Sunday morning, Dave and I birded the Lake Simcoe shoreline once again, starting in the Barrie marina and continuing east along the south end of Kempenfelt Day. We headed south and finished up around Innisfil. The weather made things frustratingly difficult, with choppy water and high amounts of haze making identification past about 500 m impossible. Nonetheless we had a few good sightings! The kittiwake was still around, sitting just off the harbour break-wall. Good numbers of Little Gulls, Common Loons and Red-necked Grebes were seen, and we even found an early Iceland Gull at the beach along the Barrie waterfront! I guess winter is almost here.
 |
| Lesser Black-backed (left), Iceland (center) and Herring Gulls - Barrie, ON |
We also stumbled across this Great Black-backed Gull along the beach that had been banded.
 |
| Great Black-backed Gull - Barrie, ON |
 |
| Great Black-backed Gull - Barrie, ON |
 |
| Great Black-backed Gull - Barrie, ON |
I have since sent off the information and will hopefully receive a follow up with details about this bird. Note the juvenile Lesser Black-backed Gull in the back right of the image...
 |
| Great Black-backed Gull - Barrie, ON |
Around noon on Saturday, Amanda Guercio and Nigel Shaw were also birding Kempenfelt Bay. They not only relocated the juvenile Pacific Loon but found an adult Pacific Loon with it! Unfortunately these loons remained elusive for other birders throughout the day, as is often the case with loons here. The flock is so massive that if they are far enough offshore or if the weather conditions are poor, finding any rarities mixed in may be next to impossible.
However, this morning Ken Burrell managed to see the juvenile Loon from Minet's Point (the place where David Szmyr and I originally found it). Later, Barb Charlton and Brett Fried relocated both loons, then were shocked to discover a 3rd Pacific Loon with them! This one was also an adult. The fun didn't end there as a 4th(!) Pacific Loon, also an adult, swam into view. I don't think any more than two Pacific Loons have been seen before at one point in southern Ontario.
Needless to say I headed back up to the Lake after work to see if I could turn them up. The rain was intermittent making visibility difficult, and most of the loons were distant to the east. I checked a few locations east along the shoreline, and eventually ended up at Tyndale Park after 90 minutes of fruitless scanning. I was talking on the phone with friend and fellow birder Jeremy Bensette when I spotted the distinctive silvery nape of an adult Pacific Loon! With it was a second adult bird, as well as the juvenile. I couldn't find the fourth bird unfortunately, but I was happy with 3!
Needless to say Lake Simcoe continues to amaze this October - I'm sure a few more good birds are out there.
2 comments:
I was correct when I suggested some time ago that you should check out Lake Simcoe this fall!
psychedelic sunrise!!
Post a Comment