Finally! A change at Tilbury

This morning when I posted I lamented how, despite excellent conditions, the rare birds were just not showing up at the Tilbury lagoons. I did have an American Avocet there early in July, but ever since then the rarest birds have been the regular Long-billed Dowitchers.

It seems that for today at least, the curse was slightly broken. While no rarities were found, there was a huge change in the numbers and diversity at Tilbury with a few interesting birds mixed in. Beforehand, let me mention that the quality of the photos leave something to desire. The birds were a little too far away for me to use the 300mm, so I resorted to digiscoping with my 18-55 lens.

My coworker, Matt, and I took a break from work and made the quick trip over to the lagoons. One of the first birds we saw was this Horned Grebe, hanging out with a couple of Pied-billed Grebes. What a weird sighting! I have never seen one at the lagoons. It almost seems that an Eared Grebe would have been more likely.

Horned Grebe - Tilbury lagoons

Around this time, another car pulled in and I realized it was my friends Ken and Mike Burrell. They were doing a big loop of the southern Ontario shorebird spots and had already seen an Upland Sandpiper at Mitchell and 2 Red-necked Phalaropes at Exeter. Together, the 4 of us scoped the "shorebird cell" at Tilbury with a few highlights.

This juvenile Red-necked Phalarope stood out and was one of the first birds I looked at. I nice surprise, and a new one for my Tilbury list (as well as Ontario year list, but who's counting).

juvenile Red-necked Phalarope - Tilbury lagoons

Stilt Sandpipers had arrived. Earlier in the fall I had seen 1 or 2 adults, but today 3 juveniles were present. Neat looking birds, and one of my favorites.

juvenile Stilt Sandpiper - Tilbury lagoons

I was happy to finally see a few Baird's Sandpipers at Tilbury - the first ones of the fall for me here. They were both juveniles.

juvenile Baird's Sandpiper - Tilbury lagoons

Of course there were still Dowitchers - 3 adult Long-billed, and the rest juvenile and adult Short-billed. Some of the Long-billed Dowitchers were quite far along in their prebasic molt. No pics today.

Other birds seen include 14 Great Egrets (a lot less than the 40 Blake had!), 2 Black-crowned Night-herons, both species of Teal, 5 Northern Shovelers, and 8 Wood Ducks.

This afternoon I brought my camera into the field with me in case I came across any butterflies. I found a few Fiery Skippers and an un-IDed Duskywing. My guess is Wild Indigo.

female Fiery Skipper - Turkey Creek, Windsor

I kind of like this shot of a Viceroy on the gravel path.

Viceroy - Turkey Creek, Windsor

This mama and her two fauns kept an eye on me as I approached.

White-tailed Deer - Turkey Creek, Windsor

White-tailed Deer - Turkey Creek, Windsor

That's all for now. I am hoping to go to Pelee first thing tomorrow, or at the very least Tilbury again.

Not much news

Another week, come and gone. I did make it out to the Tilbury lagoons twice, and as expected, nothing new was seen.

Shorebirds included 11 species, and the highlight were the same 4 Long-billed Dowitchers. Many of them are undergoing extensive feather molt.

Long-billed Dowitcher - Tilbury lagoons

The duck scene is getting slightly more interesting. On Wednesday, among the 300 Mallards I noticed a female Bufflehead, 3 Northern Shoveler, 11 Wood Ducks, and a smattering of both species of teal. One can only hope for a Cinnamon Teal or Garganey.

At work, I spent an hour one afternoon with 3 of my co-workers as well as Tom Preney hiking through the Springgarden ANSI. We checked out a nice spot that had a large amount of Rough Blazingstar. Here is a Silver-spotted Skipper on it:

Silver-spotted Skipper on Rough Blazingstar

This appears to be a meadowhawk of some sort.

Meadowhawk sp.

And finally, a little American toad I found sitting on a trail.

American Toad

This weekend I am slated to work a fair bit but I am hoping to get out at least once to Point Pelee or Tilbury. I would also like to take a walk in the Ojibway Prairie and try to turn up some new butterflies.....

In other news...its almost jaeger time!!!! Once we get a few cold fronts followed by some east winds, Long-tailed and perhaps Parasitic should start to show up in western Lake Ontario. SW winds may bring something good to the tip of Pelee. Unfortunately I will miss the majority of Long-tailed Jaeger season because of my trip to Nova Scotia. It was not too long ago that a Manx Shearwater was spotted at Van Wagner's Beach early in the jaeger season (August 31, 2006), as well as a Long-billed Curlew (August 23, 2009).

Townsend Sewage Lagoons

This evening I headed to the Townsend sewage lagoons with Brett Fried with the hopes that the looming thunderstorms would ground some shorebirds. The first lagoon has had decent shorebird habitat all summer and good numbers of peeps had been reported. This was my first visit to the site in over a year.

The weather hadn't grounded as many shorebirds as we had anticipated but we still had good numbers of 11 species. Highlights included:

-Thousands and thousands of swallows. Brett and I estimated that there were somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 present. All 6 species were there including 3 lingering Purple Martins. Tree and Bank Swallows made up 95 percent of the swallows.
-1 White-rumped Sandpiper (adult)
-1 Short-billed Dowitcher (juv)
-3 Baird's Sandpipers (adult)

No pictures due to the weather.

Tomorrow I will check out Tilbury on my way to work. I'm getting pretty excited - only 2 more weeks of work and then I am done. My job is great, don't get me wrong (after all, I spend all day wandering around in tallgrass prairie!) but I am ready for a change. I have a flight booked to Nova Scotia on August 26th, where I will spend 10 days with my lovely girlfriend, Laura. I doubt I will get out birding much, but we might do a bit of shorebirding on the coast, a much more scenic location than the stinky sewage lagoons of Ontario. After that I will be back in Guelph for my last year at the university.

Central Kingbirds and more

This past week I brought my camera into the field a couple of times and managed to get a few shots of some butterflies. Common Ringlets are becoming more and more common. I saw at least one every day last week!

Common Ringlet - Windsor, Ontario

Among the skippers seen last week was this Peck's.

Peck's Skipper - Windsor, Ontario

On Wednesday, I noticed an Ontbirds post from James Holdsworth about a Western Kingbird and 3 hybrid juvenile Eastern x Western Kingbirds. I have never seen hybrid kingbirds and the location was about 2 minutes from my office, so Dan Riley and I swung by one afternoon and took a look at these "Central" Kingbirds. Pretty cool to see Westerns attempt breeding in Windsor, even though only one half of the pair was the right species. The photos are pretty bad and I'll attribute that to the very poor lighting and heavy cropping.

juvenile Eastern x Western Kingbird - Windsor, Ontario

 

juvenile Eastern x Western Kingbird - Windsor, Ontario

The adult Western Kingbird was present too. I had only seen this species once before (an adult seen in November, 2009 in Port Burwell) so it was nice to reacquaint myself with the species. For better photos that were taken by James Holdsworth and Dwayne Murphy, check out Dwayne's blog: http://dwaynejava.blogspot.com/

Western Kingbird - Windsor, Ontario

Yesterday I decided to check out Point Pelee before going to Cambridge for the weekend. It was a beautiful day - warm but not hot, with a nice breeze coming in off the lake. Seacliff Beach was first on my agenda. I had a bit of fun taking some shots of the abundant Larids. There were 8 species of gulls/terns present - Caspian, Forster's, and Common Terns as well as Bonaparte's, Great Black-backed, Lesser Black-backed, Ring-billed, and Herring Gulls. The only LBBG was this individual, molting from 1st summer to 2nd winter plumage.

Lesser Black-backed Gull - Seacliff Beach, Ontario

I had limited time in the park so I decided to walk the West Beach trail from the VC to the tip. Many Giant Swallowtails were taking advantage of the abundant Spotted Knapweed.

Giant Swallowtail - Point Pelee National Park

I was happy to see 2 new butterflies - 2 Dun Skippers (no photos) and 3 Horace's Duskywngs. Horace's had been reported on and off for the past week or two, but I was still surprised when I came across them.  They were all within 5 feet of the water's edge, landing on some of the vegetation that had washed up on shore.

Horace's Duskywing - Point Pelee National Park

Horace's Duskywing - Point Pelee National Park

This was an odd sight - a Great Blue Heron flocking with the gulls. Another 1st summer/2nd winter LBBG was with this flock as well.

Great Blue Heron - Point Pelee National Park

A single Eastern Comma allowed me to take its photo.

Eastern Comma - Point Pelee National Park

From there, I headed over to the Tilbury lagoons. The conditions still remain excellent but still there wasn't much turnover. These lagoons are now probably being checked close to every day so I would imagine that if something really rare drops in, it has a good chance of being seen and reported.

Among the 12 species of shorebirds were 4 adult Long-billed Dowitchers, 3 Short-billed Dowitchers (including 2 juvies), and an adult Stilt Sandpiper. Only 3 Great Egrets this time.

Leps from work

This afternoon I took a bit of time to try out my new lens. I have owned it for a more than a week and used it a few times, but that was mostly for documentation purposes. Today was fairly overcast and I noticed quite a bit of activity with the butterflies, so I dragged the lens out into the field. 

Some of the first butterflies I noticed were some skippers low in the sedges of the tallgrass prairie. Here is a Least: 

Least Skipper - Windsor, Ontario

 and presumably, a Little Glassywing.

Little Glassywing - Windsor, ON

This was the only American Lady seen -it was frequenting a patch of Ironweed.

American Lady - Windsor, Ontario

It didn't take me long before I decided to chase after some of the swallowtails, working a bunch of Ironweed and Dense Blazingstar. I was happy to get close to a pair of Giant Swallowtails and grab my first shots of this species.

Giant Swallowtail - Windsor, Ontario

 This Black Swallowtail was an easy photo subject. The clouds had lifted at this point, making the light slightly harsher.

Black Swallowtail - Windsor, Ontario

Black Swallowtail - Windsor, Ontario

Also observed were Eastern Tiger and Spicebush Swallowtails. It was easy to miss a lot of the skippers with the big, gaudy species vying for attention. I did snap a few photos.

Silver-spotted Skippers were seen from far away as they patrolled many of the flowering plants.

Silver-spotted Skipper - Windsor, Ontario

There were a few small, whitish butterflies down low in the grasses. I managed to get a good look at an Acadian Hairstreak as well as photograph Eastern Tailed-Blue and Summer Azure.

Eastern Tailed-Blue - Windsor, Ontario

Summer Azure - Windsor, Ontario

A few Hummingbird Clearwings were see and I was happy to get a photo I was quite happy with, even though I didn't freeze the wings.

Hummingbird Clearwing - Windsor, ON

Monarch - Windsor, ON

A tour of Essex County

Today I decided to take full advantage of my day off and tour around, hopefully kicking up some cool birds and butterflies.
The first stop was Tilbury. This remains the best, easily excessible shorebird spot in the county and it wasn't bad today. There must have been a big influx of dowitchers as there were more than a dozen. 5 of them were Long-billed and a few juvenile Short-billed were around. I didn't get any photos as they were too far for my 300 lens. I did, however, grab a few shots of this closerish Lesser Yellowlegs.

juvenile Lesser Yellowlegs - Tilbury lagoons

Cormies!

Double-crested Cormorants - Tilbury lagoon

Next up was the Ridgetown Lagoons. I was actually disappointed as I thought that there would be more habitat than there was. The smaller cell did have mudflats, but the geese were hoarding them. There were, however, a handful of semi-sands, a single Least Sandpiper, a single Semi-Plover, and a couple Lesser Yellowlegs.

Blenheim was next on the agenda. I hadn't actually visited in a few weeks so I wasn't prepared for how terrible it would be. Every single one of the lagoons was filled to the brim with water, and even the sprinkler cells were completely dry! Highlights from here included Mallard and Starling. Well, there was still a single Semipalmated Sandpiper that I watched for a bit. I kind of felt sorry for it, "foraging" on bare dirt. I also scanned through about 500 Mourning Doves and didn't see anything interesting. On to Erieau!

Off the pier were various gulls and terns, including a 1st summer/2nd winter Lesser Black-backed. There were tons of people here hanging out on the pier, so I didn't linger. Off of Erie Beach I had a young Little Gull with the Bonaparte's, which I think is the first one of those for me this year.

Next I checked out Hillman Marsh, Wheatley Harbour, and the harbour by Sturgeon Woods. I didn't see anything unexpected, though I got a second Little Gull at the harbour by Sturgeon Woods.

The final stop was at a weedy field in Leamington to look for butterflies. 3 or 4 Common Checkered Skippers were nice!

Common Checkered-skipper - Leamington

As was this thing, which I think is a Fiery Skipper?

Fiery Skipper - Leamington

That's all for now. Overall it was a typical day for early August - hot weather, lots of driving, few birds, but a couple nice summering gulls/migrant shorebirds/southern butterflies.

This and that

Another week has come and gone with me unable to get out and go birding as often as I would like. I have been seeing a few things at work, including this Common Ringlet.

Common Ringlet - Windsor, Ontario

Common Ringlet has never been common in extreme southwestern Ontario, but it has been expanding as of late. The first Essex Co. record was only 10 years ago! This one location on my study site seems to be a hotspot for them - two days ago I had a high count of 6. I wouldn't be surprised if this is a record high count for Essex county?

Here is a neonate Butler's Gartersnake (regurgitating an earthworm) from the study site a few days ago. These guys have already tripled their weight since they were born (all my radio snakes gave birth between July 14 and July 27). They eat earthworms presumably every evening, and some then move under our coverboards to thermo-regulate and digest their meal.

Butler's Gartersnake - Windsor, Ontario

This 12-point buck is usually seen most days in one particular area of the study site. I happened to bring my camera with the new lens out in the field with me and got a few half decent shots in the fading light.

White-tailed Deer - Windsor, Ontario

Yesterday afternoon I heard from Russ Jones about a mysterious sighting of a possible Whooping Crane near the St. Joachim exit. I called Steve Pike and he mentioned that a friend of his who knows birds saw a "large white bird with black wingtips and a black face" fly over him while he was driving on the 401. This person saw the bird land in a field on the south side of the road. I guess another possibility is that this bird was a wood stork.

Dan Riley and I decided to check it out. We didn't find anything, so we continued on to check the Tilbury lagoons.

4 species of herons were present including 18 Great Egrets. This is the most that I have seen there this summer, and so I continue to hold out hope for a Cattle Egret, or maybe a Little Blue Heron! Reddish Egret would be nice too...

Great Egret - Tilbury Lagoons

This Black-crowned Night-Heron kept a watchful eye on me. It was one of five seen.

Black-crowned Night-Heron - Tilbury lagoons

There were decent numbers of shorebirds present of 10 species. The highlight were the dowitchers - 2 were definite Long-billed Dowitchers, and 2 were Short-billed. The two LBDOs were hanging out together up close, providing a great oppurtunity to study their plumage. The darker back, rounder body shape, more distinct lower half of eye-ring, and patterning on the undertail coverts/flanks were easy to see. 1 bird was most likely a female as it had an extremely long bill.

Thats all for now. I hope to do a round of shorebirding tomorrow, hitting up some of the hotspots in Essex/Chatham-Kent.

There's no place like home.

Today I had very little on the agenda, so I slept in and went for a few hikes in the afternoon and evening. The first place I went was the Grand River. It is only about 2 kms from my parent's place in Cambridge and I place that I spent many hours at as a kid.

There were hoards of bikers and dog-walkers on the trail, but once I headed off into the bush I didn't see another soul (except a hobo who had set up camp).

I tried to photograph some insects, even though the light was kind of crappy at mid day.

Cabbage White - Grand River, Ontario

I'm not really sure what species of skipper this is and I don't have any reference books nearby. It was feeding on Joe Pye weed.

Tawny-edged Skipper - Grand River, Ontario (thanks to Kirk Zufelt for the ID)

Ebony Jewelwing - Grand River, Ontario

Little Wood-Satyr - Grand River, Ontario

The bird life was what one would expect for mid afternoon on a 30 degree day in mid-August. Not much was singing! Among the usuals (Indigo Buntings, E. Kingbirds, SOSPs, etc) there were a few highlights, such as a Belted Kingfisher, 40+ Chimney Swifts hawking insects, Osprey, and a few shorebirds. There were 3 Lesser Yellowlegs and 2 Least Sandpipers mixed in with about 30 Killdeer on a rocky island. This is the first time that I've ever seen migrating shorebirds at the river.

Also interesting to see were 2 presumably summering Common Mergansers.

Common Mergansers - Grand River, Ontario

I didn't see too many herps today but I stopped to grab a quick shot of this Northern Leopard Frog.

Northern Leopard Frog - Grand River, Ontari

This evening I checked out a few of my favorite areas to the southwest of Cambridge. I photographed this Question Mark,

Question Mark - North Dumfries, Ontario

and saw a nice variety of Grassland Birds. They included Eastern Bluebird, Savannah and Grasshopper Sparrow, Eastern Meadowlark, Merlin, Killdeer, Eastern Kingbird, and Brown Thrasher.

Grasshopper Sparrow - North Dumfries, Ontario

All in all, nothing to crazy was found but it was nice to check out some of my regular spots that I have somewhat neglected in recent years.