Russell's Big Year

THE MAP

2011-01-05T12:56:00.000-08:00

60,000+ KMs driven!

BLACK = driven
RED = flown (luckily, paid for by work-related projects!)

2010 TOP 10 Moments

2011-01-05T12:15:00.000-08:00

It's really hard to make a list like this of course but here are a few of my favourite moments from this wild year (In chronological order):

-Driving through the icy-foggy Fraser Canyon at night in February (Williams Lake to Ladner overnight dove-twitch with Kevin Easthope), and realizing that this kind of thing would become the norm.

-Hustling (or whatever it's called when you punch through thigh-deep snow and crawl over burned logs on a steep slope) 2km through the darkness for a Spotted Owl. Not only did we get to see the pair at point-blank range before they headed out to hunt, but on our slog back to camp, wolves filled the night with their mournful chorus (March in the Stein Valley)--and can't go wrong with a free heli ride!

-Finding a male White-headed Woodpecker foraging right beside my car (April in the Okanagan)

-Breaking the BC Big Day record with 197 species in 24hours, the last being a pair of Barred Owls calling in a wind-storm at Crescent Park near White Rock, BC.

-Getting to watch a Yellow Rail out in the open for over 45 minutes (May in the Peace)

-Driving over 115km "below empty" between Prince George and McBride (you had to be there)

-Finally finding a single male Cape May Warbler at the Beaver Lake Rec Site along Hwy 77 NW of Fort Nelson. If it hadn't been for that one bird, I might very well have quit the year... thank you Mr. Cape May!

-Watching thousands of alcids stream out of Triangle Island at dawn (August)--including over 7,000 Tufted Puffins and 1 Horned Puffin!

-Hearing someone yell, "LAYSAN!!!" on a September pelagic off Tofino

-EARLY NOVEMBER: From a fantastic Haida Gwaii trip to the mega-rarities down south!

Planning a Big Year

2011-01-05T11:06:00.001-08:00

Big Birding Years are a fun way to challenge yourself. Your skills will undoubtedly improve as you learn more about identification and attempt to anticipate where particular birds will turn up and when. Big Years can be done in large areas like BC, or you can do them in an area as small as your yard. It's a way of motivating yourself to get outdoors and visit areas that you might not otherwise know about. It adds another fun angle to an already enjoyable past-time, and can also bring fellow birders together in the spirit of friendly competition! And of course you can add a healthy-flavour to it by making it a non-motorized year!

Although many folks won't be interested in the more-or-less "high-octane" style of Big Year that I performed in 2010, a self-paced BC Big Year can be attractive to many and I would thoroughly recommend it. Just by visiting Vancouver Island, Vancouver, the Okanagan, and the Peace River regions, in one year (at appropriate times)... any birder could rack up close to 300 species-- That's a lot of birds!

For those interested, here are some strategic pointers and some personal stats:

#1 Rule: If you're serious about a big year, you need to chase rarities. You miss them half the time but in the long run it will be worth it!

Jan-Mar: Concentrate on winter specialties (e.g. Gulls, redpolls, gyrfalcon, Harris's Sparrow, etc.), woodpeckers, game-birds, and owls (I had 13 species of owls by March).

April-May: It's migration time. The two main places you want to be are #1 The Coast (for rarities and shorebirds), and #2 The Okanagan (for tough breeders like Grasshopper Sparrow, Flammulated Owl, and Williamson's Sapsucker). This is also the time you want to clean up on all passerine breeders if possible--everything from Black-throated Gray Warbler to Boreal Chickadee.

June: Best time to visit the Peace Region as all birds are back and singing away. I found that July was getting a little late for birdsong and May was slightly early for some species. If possible you can continue north-west up the Alaska Highway for more northerly breeders like ptarmigan and Arctic Tern etc., at least rarities tend to tail off around June-July.

July-October: Seabirds, shorebirds, and rarities. This is the CRUNCH TIME which will make or break your year. Basing yourself near the coast will be helpful but if your big year is centered around your home-turf, you can still find some goodies.

Nov-Dec: Winter clean-up and sporadic rarity-chasing. I only added 5 species in November and only 1 in December. Some years can be better than others. Good birds did show up but they were things I already had like Acorn Woodpecker, Palm Warbler, Iceland Gull, and Northern Mockingbird.

My 'PACE' Breakdown:

100 species by January 7th (i.e the first day I hit the coast)
200- March 26
300- May 26 (314 by end of May)
330- Aug 7
350- Aug 30
370- Nov 10 (373 at year's end)

2010: A Year in Review

2011-01-03T21:18:00.000-08:00

Well it's over now. Time to reflect! I've checked the list a couple times and things seem to be in order. 373 species seen [355 self-found]including the American Black-Ducks of Yellow Point (which Mike Toochin also tallied), and the freshly split Winter/Pacific Wrens. I also counted Cackling Goose, Dusky Grouse, and Eurasian Collared-Dove which were not on the checklist when Mike and Sharon did their big year-- on the other hand, Crested Myna has disappeared since then.

In addition to the full species, I also attempted to rack up various subspecies that could possibly warrant splits in the future. These include:

-"Aleutian" Cackling Goose

-Both "Taiga" and "Franklin's" Spruce Grouse

-The laingi subspecies of Goshawk (Haida Gwaii and Vancouver Island)

-"Harlan's" (Red-tailed) Hawk

-"Richardson's" Merlin (east of the Rockies)

-The southern wymani (nominate) race of Western Gull. A single adult was observed near Tofino that was distinctly darker than typical occidentalis Western Gulls. Photos were taken--hopefully we can follow up on this in due time.

-brooksi subspecies of Northern Saw-whet Owl (Haida Gwaii)

-picoideus subspecies of Hairy Woodpecker (Haida Gwaii)

-carlottae subspecies of Steller's Jay (Haida Gwaii)

-ruficapilla (Eastern) subspecies of Nashville Warbler (1 seen near Dawson Ck)

-Both "Myrtle" and "Audubon's" Yellow-rumped Warblers

-Red, Sooty, and Slate-coloured Fox Sparrows... and a few mixes!?

-carlottae subspecies of Pine Grosbeak (Haida Gwaii)

-at least 4 types of Red Crossbill

***And a couple key types that I missed:

-Common Teal (Eurasian form of Green-winged Teal, split by the BOU)
-"Eastern" White-breasted Nuthatch (Peace/Central Interior)
-"Timberline" Brewer's Sparrow

Some of you will notice that I have a "MISSED" page up (links for all pages are near the top of the main/Home page). By looking at those misses (plus a bunch of others since around 410 species were seen by all in BC in 2010), I think it would be possible to get 380 in a year. This would require absolute dedication, sound planning, and lots of luck. Finding a way to get further offshore (i.e. 100 nautical mile range) would also help!

Time to give thanks!

2011-01-03T15:06:00.000-08:00

First, the THANK YOUS! This year was made truly special by all of you who got involved; Either by providing a couch to sleep on, offering a vehicle on a "twitch," sending messages of support, reading this blog, and just "going birding." I can't begin to tell you how thankful I am. Not only did I break the record, but I learned so much about the province and its birds and was able to share it with everyone... so many people took me out around their local patch and showed me the best nooks and crannies to find birds, and brave were those who volunteered to join me on crazy drives from the Okanagan to the Yukon or NWT and back... what a ride! Sorry but I feel the need to mention a few names (luckily there is no Oscar music to cut me off!). I'm sure I'm missing a few people but here we go---

Housing (key to my survival):

Ahren McIntee (New Westminster)
Arnold Skei (Sechelt)
Avery Bartels (Nelson)
Barb & Tony! (Vancouver)
Brendan Benson (Kelowna)
Cathy Antoniazzi (Prince George)
Captain Ron (Sandspit, Haida Gwaii)
Christine Rock & Paul Levesque (East Vancouver)
Christopher Coxson (Prince George)
C.C.G.S. Vector (Port Hardy to Prince Rupert!)
Cooper Beauchesne & Associates (Revelstoke)
Devin Mackenzie & Wyatt Seddon-Johnstone (East Vancouver)
Dad’s CR-V
The entire Easthope family (Williams Lake)
My car Franscesca (’93 Toyota Tercel)
Ilya Povalyaev (South Surrey)
Jared Hobbs (Victoria)
Jukka Jantunen (Comox)
Julia Cannings (Victoria)
Alexis Harrington (Sechelt)
Marc Wiebe & Vanessa Johnson (Victoria)
Mom’s Nissan Sentra (aka “Ben”)
Natalie Jacyna (Tofino)
Samantha Brett (and her tent, which unfortunately met its end thanks to a bear!)
Syd Cannings (Whitehorse)
And of course my PARENTS!!!

Special thanks also to:
[For tactical advice, bird alerts, and particularly road/boat buddies!]
Al McTavish
Art Ahier
Avery Bartels
Cameron Eckert
Christopher Coxson
Chris Charlesworth
Dave Smith
Doug Brown
Gabe David
Gary Breault
Guy Monty
Ian Cruickshank
Ilya Povalyaev
Kevin Easthope
Kevin Neill
Linda Van Damme
Phil Ranson
Rick Howie
Rick Toochin
Rob Lyske
Jeremy Gatten
Jack Bowling
Jared Hobbs
Jess Findlay
Joël Gillis
Jukka Jantunen
Marianne Secrest
Norma & Carlo Giovanella
Pete Davidson
Peter Hamel & Margo Hearn
Samantha Brett
Thor Manson
--AND MANY MORE

I also want to thank John Cooper, Suzanne Beauchesne, Harry van Oort and the entire CBA staff for being so flexible and understanding (whilst providing the main dollars behind this project!)... like letting me drive from Golden to Dunbar for a Costa's Hummingbird when I should have been doing data entry! Truly a fantastic company to be apart of!

"Big Ups" to Michael Force, Danny Tyson, Michael Bentley, Roger Foxall, and Mike & Sharon Toochin for setting the BC Big Year bar sooo high and lending support throughout the year. I have a feeling this record might already be in jeopardy?!

And last but most importantly, I need to thank my parents Dick Cannings and Margaret Holm... could NOT have done this without your support, whether it be strategic, emotional, financial, or otherwise, you were always there to kick me out of bed when I was being lazy, and give me "that look" when I felt like giving up.

Day 365

2010-12-31T16:15:00.000-08:00

And now for peace...

Good birds on the Penticton Christmas Bird Count

2010-12-20T16:07:00.001-08:00

Yesterday (Dec 19th) I went out on the Penticton CBC, and helped cover the Okanagan lakshore and a portion of the local Indian Reserve (the Locatee lands). Despite the constant snow we had some great birds including 4 MEW GULLS, 55 GLAUCOUS-WINGED GULLS (high number for the south Okanagan), 7 RUBY-CROWNED KINGLETS (all in the Locatee lands), 1 SWAMP SPARROW (Locatee), 1 PURPLE FINCH (my first ever for the Okanagan--also in Locatee), and this HERMIT THRUSH (my first winter-find of this species in the Okanagan... of course it was also in the Locatee property--what a spot!).

Today (Dec 20th), my Dad and I hiked back into Locatee and managed to re-find the PURPLE FINCH and as luck would have it... another 4 species I missed the day before! This would have brought the day list to close to 70 but ah well... The highlight was seeing 2 SNOW BUNTINGS flying over the West Bench on our walk home.

#373: HARRIS'S SPARROW

2010-12-18T19:41:00.000-08:00

It took 11 months and 17 days, but finally I nailed a HARRIS'S SPARROW! I chased them high and low last winter but didn't fret, assuuuuming one would turn up in the Okanagan this winter. Well I was beginning to doubt myself but finally yesterday (Dec 17th), I was able to re-find an adult bird first discovered a few days earlier on the Lake Country Christmas Bird Count (Thanks Don+Don+Margaret!). This was my second try at the spot so it was quite disappointing to pull up and see no sparrows whatsoever. But once the ever-lucky Tanya Seebacher dropped in, I spotted it 100+m away in a hedge down the road... not just another LBJ!

It's impossible to know, but perhaps this will be my final bird for 2010, as time is running short, and there are few birds to add.

Sorry for the lack of posts lately! I've been pretty sick, plus I had my computer stolen in Richmond last week. More on that later probably. I think I'll just do a big write-up at the end of the year and explain what I did to cap things off.

Merry X-mas all!

Russ

Texas Itinerary now available!

2010-12-05T12:16:00.000-08:00

Hi all,

Check out the itinerary for my upcoming TX tour in April 2011. Can't wait! Be sure to book ASAP as we're trying to keep the group to an intimate size. My Dad and I birded Texas in April this year and saw over 300 species... it's different every time so who knows what the highlights will be next year?! Not just for the hardcore, this trip will be fun for all skill-levels!

http://www.avocettours.ca/tours/2011-texas-coast.php

Also, let me know if you're interested in hearing about my birding tour to India in October, 2011!

Ancient Murrelet meets its end in Okanagan Lake

2010-11-24T09:22:00.000-08:00

This morning I woke up to a report of an Ancient Murrelet washed up on Okanagan Beach. There were no specifics in the report so I scoured the entire beach from the Penticton Yacht club over to the S.S. Sicamous. It was probably close to -20 with the windchill coming off the lake, so it's no surprise I missed the little dude covered in ice. Highlgihts of my walk include a single YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLER at the yacht club and a single RUDDY DUCK hiding behind a tugboat with some coots and a PIED-BILLED GREBE.

Later in the day my Dad got a call from the woman who first found the bird. We followed her instructions right to the bird. As you can see it was fairly hard to spot!

Dad got out the ax and we rescued the specimen from the ice... I wonder if the Little Blue Heron will suffer the same fate this week? Someone should be checking regularly!

From the ice to our sink! (then to the freezer)

Typical Cannings Family dinnertime moment:

Dad; "Achk! There's an ancient murrelet feather in my potatoes!"

Little Blue Heron, White-winged Scoter, Northern Parula, Gyrfalcon and Lesser Black-backed Gull in just over 24 hours in the Okanagan---what a mix!

2010-11-22T11:29:00.000-08:00

This weekend I joined up with 2 ol' birding friends in Avery Bartels and Ilya Povalyaev (now of Calgary, AB!). We birded West Kelowna region Saturday morning and after a few hours of squinting into the wind and snow we finally found the LITTLE BLUE HERON at a Beach Access of Whitworth Road. In its weakened state, I doubt it will survive the next couple nights. Also in the area, we spotted 4 WHITE-WINGED SCOTERS heading south-- a nice Okanagan year-bird and only my 2nd fall sighting.

The rest of the day was spent in the south where we failed to turn up the parula thanks in part to a bitter north wind that shook the trees constantly. Avery turned up a HERMIT THRUSH and roosting GREAT HORNED OWL though!

Nov 21- We started off back at Inkaneep PP and it didn't take long to nab the NORTHERN PARULA which is still energetically feeding away but like the heron it was looking kinda cold! Afterwards we headed south to Osoyoos, picking up a gorgeous GYRFALCON along Black Sage Road! What a bird and my third close-encounter with this species this year (4 total I think!).

[crappy shot of it flyin away!]

Later that day, back in Kelowna we sighted the LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL (probably recently returned from an unknown breeding site). This bird winters in Kelowna every winter (for the past 8+ years I think).

All in all, a great weekend despite the cold!

Russ

Anyone wanna go to Texas?

2010-11-17T09:09:00.000-08:00

Join me in April for the spring spectacle!

http://www.avocettours.ca/tours/2011-texas-coast.php

NEW ZEALAND TOUR FEB 2011 !!!!!!

2010-11-14T15:14:00.000-08:00

Anyone wanna check out New Zealand in the austral summer? I lived there for a year back in 2008 and I'm very excited to take some people down to "the seabird capital of the world." The tour is 20 days out of Vancouver for only $5350 plus airfare. Yes it's a little pricey but if you compare to other bird-tour companies like WINGS and Eagle Eye, it's actually quite cheap! We'll visit all my favourite spots both on the ocean and in the interior. New Zealand is home to a variety of unique endemic species (many of which are flightless thanks to thousands of years without mammalian predators) and I'll do my best to get them all for you! So essentially the trip will focus on 1) Having a good time, 2)Seeing some amazing scenery 3)mainland endemics and 4) Seabird bonanza!

Feb 13-March 4 (2011)

Highlights of the trip include:

-Hauraki Gulf pelagic trip: targeting the recently rediscovered NZ STORM-PETREL, as well as several other petrel and shearwater species.

-Kaikoura pelagic trip: should get arodn 5 species of albatross on this trip alone!

-3 species of penguin!

-visiting the only mainland albatross colony in the world (Royal Albatrosses at Taiaroa Head near Dunedin, NZ--- my home town!)

-Several night-time KIWI expeditions

-Black Stilt (one of the rarest shorebirds in the world)

-Wrybill (one of the weirdest birds in the world)

-Kea [alpine parrot](according a recent BBC study, the smartest non-human animal in the World)

much more!!! Please email me directly and ASAP as this thing will start to fill up soon. (russellcannings@shaw.ca] I can send you all the info you need, and of course answer questions on the birds, other animals, plants, and locations we will visit.

Here are some photos to tantalize your brain!

[White-capped Albatross-- a guarantee on this trip!]

[Campbell Island Albatross--- should see!]

[Battling Gibson's (Wandering) Albatrosses (3.5m wingspan) --- guaranteed!]

LITTLE BLUE HERON!!!

2010-11-13T21:32:00.000-08:00

[Photos by Jukka Jantunen]

Just when I thought I could get back to some casual Vancouver birding, my Dad calls me at 7am (still trying to catch up on sleep). "Russell, it's a Little Blue. I'm going for it right now. Watch out for snow on the Coq."

4 hours later I arrived at Power's Creek in West Kelowna, only to find out that the bird was "missing." Luckily within 10 minutes Doug Brown pulled up announcing that he had found it. Sure enough, there it was on some random beach about 1km away. After a few minutes it got up and flew off... back to the creek. After that I got to watch it along with several others from around 15 feet away as it hunted in the shallows. What a bird! 1rst record for the Okanagan and 3rd for the province!

Northern Mockingbird=YES, Philly Vireo=NO

2010-11-13T21:29:00.000-08:00

After a pancake breakfast at my parents' place in Penticton, Jukka/Jess/I headed down to the coast where the NORTHERN MOCKINGBIRD of Island 22 performed on cue, landing on a gravel pile before we had even parked the car. We searched the nearby woods for several hours for a reported Philadelphia Vireo but unfortunately could not pull it out from the hordes of chickadees and kinglets.

Northern Parula-- YES!

2010-11-13T21:24:00.000-08:00

After completing another wild drive thanks to Jukka's steady hands, lots of coffee, "Beaver Buzz" energy drinks, Finnish heavy metal, and lots of bird-trivia, we arrived in the sunny South Okanagan. Here in Inkaneep Provincial Park it didn't take long to locate the immature male NORTHERN PARULA found by Don Cecile a few days earlier. Phew! I was stressin' out a bit on the islands but this felt great! I hadn't slept since 5:30 am the day before but I guess I'm getting used to it? Maybe not. Jukka suggested we continue on to Chilliwack for the mockingbird but I felt that sleeping in a bed tonight instead of a ditch was the smart thing to do.

[photos by Jess Findlay]

Haida Gwaii: The Southern Aleutians

2010-11-13T21:23:00.001-08:00

Some have called Haida Gwaii (aka The Queen Charlotte Islands)—“The Northern Galapagos” because of its isolation as an archipelago away from the continent and its rich ecological tradition. I would argue that “Aleutians—South” is more appropriate from a birding standpoint at least. Breeding bird diversity is low on the islands, made up principally of a few hardy land-dwellers like Golden-crowned Kinglet, Varied Thrush, Pacific Wren, and Oregon Junco, and of course: the seabirds. Thousands of alcids (puffins, auklets, guillemots, murrelets, murres) and other seabirds (gulls, cormorants, storm-petrels) call Haida Gwaii home year-round and even more come through in migration and during the winter months. Waterfowl numbers can be very impressive also, especially at this time of year. Shorebirds stop over regularly along beaches and wetlands, and perhaps most interesting for us birders, the islands act as magnets for lost migrants. Birds blown off course by storms in spring and fall, taking cover in the first bit of land they see. The Aleutian Island chain is of course known as not only a breeding mecca for seabirds, but also THE place to find both Asiatic and southern rarities during migration.

That is why we decided to hit “The Gwaii” in early November... to find mega-birds. Most experienced birders chat casually about the rarity potential of the Charlottes but few manage to get out there at the right time. The weather can be dicey outside of summer and the ferry crossing can get very rough. This year, Jukka Jantunen, Cameron Eckert, Jess Findlay, and I made it happen.

Jukka, Jess, and I left Vancouver around 10am on Wednesday, November 3rd, and drove none-stop (more or less) to Prince Rupert. When we got there it was pouring rain and blowing around 100km/hour. “Just as I expected,” I said. “Too bad it’s coming from the south.” We were a little worried the new flat-bottom ferry wouldn’t run in conditions like this but luckily by the early afternoon, things cleared up and I guess the swell died down out on the Hecate Strait. Sometime after breakfast we ran into Cam (in the liquor store of all places) who had just driven down from Whitehorse to meet us. We packed all our gear in his van, boarded the ferry and off we went!

FERRY CROSSING (Nov 4th, 2:30pm until dark): We stationed ourselves at various points around the boat; unfortunately this vessel is not ideal for birders as there is no way to have a forward view unless you wanna camp out in the children’s play area and look through an awkward circular window... at least you’ve got non-stop cartoons in case the seabirds don’t put out. Anyways... the highlight of the trip was definitely getting good looks at several SHORT-TAILED SHEARWATERS [pictured above] that usually stood out well from the more abundant SOOTY SHEARWATERS (we ended up with around 20 shorties). BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKES were fairly common and we were pleased to count at least 6 YELLOW-BILLED LOONS amongst the numbers of PACIFIC and COMMON LOONS. 5 NORTHERN FULMARS were the only other tubenose, both murrelets were noted, and Jukka had a probable POMARINE JAEGER (a fairly late record any jaeger).

Once in Skidegate, we transferred over to the Alliford Bay ferry (inter-island ferry to Moresby). Once on Moresby, we drove to Sandspit where good ol’ Captain Ron had a good set-up for us in his chalet and basement.

NOV 5: First Full Day on the Charlottes

We had assumed in Prince Rupert that our trip to Haida Gwaii/Charlottes would be a very wet ordeal. Therefore it was quite a pleasant surprise to wake up to clear skies this morning. After checking through the local flock of juncos for oddballs (thanks Ron for letting us seed your driveway!), we headed to Shingle Bay and eventually the famous Sandspit Airport. Along the beach Jess and I found a female HOUSE FINCH (a very rare bird here—only 5 or 6 records for the Charlottes), and a SNOW BUNTING was also a nice find. Shingle Bay was filled with good numbers of ducks and grebes (as usual) with around 200 HARLEQUIN DUCKS stealing the show.

[Rock Sandpiper]
At the Sandspit Wharf near the base of the main peninsula where the airport is located, we rain into a large flock of 300+ BLACK TURNSTONES that also contained 30+ ROCK SANDPIPERS (pictured), 3 RUDDY TURNSTONES, 60+ DUNLIN, and 50+ SANDERLING. Amongst the gull flocks, it was once again a treat to see BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKES so close and especially over land. At the start of our airport circumnavigation hike we found a winter male RUSTY BLACKBIRD (less than 5 records for the Charlottes) feeding along the shoreline, and on the airport itself, all 5 species of geese (Brant, Canada, Cackling, Snow, Greater White-fronted) were found (not too often one can claim that!). We had more close encounters with ROCK SANDPIPERS out on the spits and more looks at SNOW BUNTINGS and LAPLAND LONGSPURS were nice. Several RED PHALAROPES were spotted feeding close to shore and around 300 PACIFIC LOONS were noted offshore (among many other things!).

We eventually made our way over to the Sandspit Golf Course where a large flock of CACKLING GEESE caught our attention. It appeared that several subspecies of Cacklers were present including at least two “ALEUTIAN GEESE.” Note (above--bird on left, and bird third from right) the overall structural differences—especially head shape, black throat (separating the pale cheek-patches), and thick white ring at the base of the neck. There were also several “DUSKY” CANADA GEESE present. Our first and only RING-NECKED DUCK of the trip flushed out of a nearby creek, as well as many WILSON’S SNIPES. Eventually it got too dark to bird and we retreated to “Dick’s Wok-in” the only restaurant in town where Cam’s fortune cookie read: “Head to the nearest coastline.” No encouragement needed!

NOV 6: Day 2 on Haida Gwaii

Last night a big storm hit and heavy rain continued into mid-morning. Luckily it cleared off and out we went for more hardcore birding. More “southern rarities” popped up like RED-WINGED BLACKBIRD (under 10 records), BREWER’S BLACKBIRD (under 5 records), and PURPLE FINCH (under 10 records). Dang this is getting frustrating!!!

Luckily the crappy weather had blown in a bunch of seabirds into Skidegate Inlet, and so the seawatching from the end of the airport was fantastic. Within seconds of setting up their scopes Jukka had seen a LEACH’S STORM-PETREL and a THICK-BILLED MURRE, and Cam had spotted a HORNED PUFFIN. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get onto the murre which would have been a year-bird but that’s just how it goes! Both SOOTY and SHORT-TAILED SHEARWATERS came within 50 meters of shore and several NORTHERN FULMARS were spotted wheeling over the surf further out. After not seeing any LONG-TAILED DUCKS on the ferry, all of a sudden it seemed like hundreds were coming in, as well as loads of RED-BREASTED MERGANSERS, COMMON MURRES, and PACIFIC LOONS among others like this presumed female BLACK SCOTER. Single WESTERN and BONAPARTE’S GULLS were certainly nice finds, and the number of CALIFORNIA GULLS (100+) was certainly a high count for this late in the year (thanks to the strong southerlies!). All 3 species of scoters streamed by close to land, and a late CASSIN’S AUKLET buzzed by around lunchtime. The golf-course produced a single SLATE-COLOURED JUNCO (apparently quite rare for the islands), and our only 2 BLACK-BELLIED PLOVERS of the trip whizzed on by. As the day winded down and the sky grew dark, that’s when the magic happened! We were all spread out birding a line of alders along a road—looking for rarities in with mixed flocks like they do in Newfoundland and Tofino. After a while, Cameron, Jess, and myself piled into the van and were about to go pick up Jukka when I got a sudden phone call from him... “CHESTNUT!!!! CHESTNUT-SIDED WARBLER!!!!!” Before Cameron could ask what the call was about I just yelled and gestured, “GO!! GO!! GOOO!!!!” I don’t think the Honda Odyssey had ever covered 200 meters in that short a time before but luckily the squeeling tires didn’t scare the bird. We arrived to see Jukka staring intently into the alders. He pointed it out and we all got onto it--- the first record for the Charlottes and my first ever for BC (let alone the year). In fact it was a BC first for everyone, so high-fives all around!

[Cameron marked the spot on the coastguard-base's wall-map... I hope that's erasable! It was still there a few days later when we stopped by again.]

Nov 7: Day 3 on Haida Gwaii

Today we took the ferry back to Graham Island and headed north toward Masset at the north end. Along the way we stopped at a few flooded fields near Tlell that produced some good November birds like HOODED MERGANSER, GREATER YELLOWLEGS, and NORTHERN PINTAIL. Both HAIRY WOODPECKER, and PINE GROSBEAK could be heard calling in the distance (both are endemic subspecies to the Charlottes), but the best was yet to come....

Just south of the Naikoon Provincial Park headquarters, we were stopped on the side of the road, investigating a few flocks of juncos and checking for waterbirds on the Tlell River. For some reason Cameron decided to scope the spruce trees on the other side of the road--- which turned out to be a very good idea. “BRAMBLING!!! %$&#ing BRAMBLING!!!” After a panicked sprint down the road we all lined up behind Cam’s scope and took turns peering into it. When I first looked in I was shaking so much I could barely make out anything... “oh shit all I can see are robins.... no wait... got it!” Wow, a male BRAMBLING hanging out in a spruce tree with robins! My first lifer in a while and a BC bird for all present! Unfortunately it flew before we could snap a photo; Jess got a video of it flying away but that was it. Luckily we all had great looks through the scope and suddenly things were goin’ REAL well.

Up north we visited the Delkatla Inlet bird sanctuary, picking up trip birds like EURASIAN WIGEON and GADWALL. Next we headed out east, stopping at the Dixon Entrance Golf Course where I spotted a WHITE-THROATED SPARROW (less than 10 island records). We made it as far as Tow Hill, unfortunately the tide was too high to walk out towards Rose Point. We made due by marveling at the pristine rainforest and rivers that remain here in Naikoon Provincial Park. We also bumped into one of the most handsome SOOTY GROUSES around.
[photos below by Cameron Eckert]

We returned to Masset and met up with local birder Margo Hearn who kindly treated us to some coffee and of course bird-talk. We saw our only WHITE-CROWNED SPARROW of the trip at her feeder... not a zono sparrow paradise this Haida Gwaii place... 1 WT, 1 WC, and only 2 GOLDEN-CROWNED SPARROWS on the whole trip! After birding the Old Masset area for a bit we finished off the day at the Dixon Entrance Golf Course east of town. Here we picked up a couple NORTHERN SHOVELERS, loads of WILSON’S SNIPE, a few large flocks of OREGON JUNCOS, a NORTHERN GOSHAWK, and probably best of all: a late LEAST SANDPIPER hanging out with a large flock of KILLDEER at the local navy base.

On the drive back to Skidegate we stopped at a few places near Tlell to look for the brooksi Northern Saw-whet Owl (an endemic subspecies). At one of these stops a vehicle pulled up to ask us if we were okay. When we replied, “we’re fine, just lookin’ for birds,” they said, “OH! Are you the guys doing the big year!!?!?!” I guess birding is getting pretty big(?), we also met a couple on the ferry who had heard about all this... oh my. Anyways, we did indeed call in a nice “HAIDA SAW-WHET OWL,” in fact in nearly took off Jess’s head. Both its contact call and full song were distinctly higher pitched than mainland saw-whets... very neat. Perhaps a future split?

Nov 8: Day 4 on Haida Gwaii

Because of the reported Northern Parula that was apparently hanging around in Oliver, we decided (for my sake) that this would be our last day on the islands; plus the following day (Tuesday) was the last day for almost a week that the ferry would be departing during the daytime, a major plus for seabird enthusiasts. We started off in beautiful Copper Bay, just south of Sandspit along the east coast. Down there we saw our 3rd NORTHERN GOSHAWK of the trip, our first RED-BREASTED SAPSUCKER, HERMIT THRUSH, and AMERICAN DIPPER of the trip. By this point we were getting pretty competitive about the trip-list so when Jess called out “dipper!” Cam, Jukka, and I sprinted all out to get there first. We didn’t want to dip on the dipper!

On our way back we birded the alders south of the golf course and I managed to relocate the CHESTNUT-SIDED WARBLER only 200m from the original spot. Moving north along the road our luck continued as Jess found a roosting (possible brooksi?) NORTHERN SAW-WHET OWL roosting in a spruce, and Jukka flushed up the Charlottes’ first ever GRASSHOPPER SPARROW!!! (no records for Alaska either)

[hard to say from this angle whether this is a brooksi saw-whet]

[Grasshopper Sparrow... not warbler]

We birded the airport one last time, finding most of the birds that had been there for several days. The only new bird to the trip after that was when I spotted a RUBY-CROWNED KINGLET in a mixed flock near the coast-guard base. Because of the already-mentioned competitiveness, when I called it out Cam came running as fast as he could from across the road. Poor Jukka, who was around 300 or 400m away just happened to look up in time to see Cameron sprinting towards me. Thinking he was about to miss some mega Asiatic vagrant, he put his body to the test—sprinting the entire stretch of field and pavement in heavy-duty rubber boots (while a little out of shape I might add). When he got within shouting distance he gasped, “what am I running for?!”

“Ruby-crowned Kinglet!” I winked.

Nothing like a good bird to keep you in shape! Believe it or not, Ruby-crowns are quite rare on the islands so despite Jukka’s wasted panic, it was a great bird for the list! Perhaps I was just getting him back for when he shouted “Grasshopper Warbler!!!” by accident when he initially spotted the sparrow... good thing I didn’t hear him clearly the first time!

Nov 9: The ferry back, and another drive for the ages

We woke up around 5:30am to make sure we had enough time to pack up our gear, catch the inter-islander ferry to Skidegate, then board the ferry to Prince Rupert. Turns out it wouldn’t have mattered since the ferry was delayed for a few hours thanks to a new storm that had come in. After a good nap it finally departed around 11:30am and we resumed our seabirding positions on deck. It’s quite amazing how much a new weather system can change things; instead of 25 Sooty Shearwaters and 20 Short-tails, we had over 1,500 SOOTY and only 2 or 3 SHORT-TAILED SHEARWATERS. Also our LONG-TAILED DUCK count went from 0 to over 7,000!!! 4,000 of those were in one flock, and 1 female decided to take a rest on the boat (pictured). Luckily after a bit of petting from her adoring fans, Cameron threw her overboard and she took flight with ease and was on her way!

[Jess with his youngsquaw]

We got-off the ferry around 6:30pm, said our goodbyes and thank-yous to Cameron for the great time, stopped at Timmy’s, and headed out.

13-15 hours later we were in Oliver...

http://www.viff.org/tixSYS/vifcguide/filmguide/eventnote.php?EventNumber=1879

2010-10-25T19:58:00.000-07:00

This might be worth attending! Sounds fun. I'll be there too!

SMEW = No

2010-10-25T19:53:00.000-07:00

Just as I was pulling into the ferry terminal in Langdale... trying to get back to the "mainland" as the rainstorm set in. The phone rings, it's local Gibson's birder George Smith... "you might want to hold on to your hat, Andre Lapointe just had a SMEW on Keats Island..."

After a rainy night of tossing back and forth ideas... mid-day found me on a small boat piloted by Capt Tony. Roger Foxall, Al McTavish, and I were heading for Plumper's Cove-- site of the reported Smew. There are not too many people crazy enough to brave wind and rain in late October by ferrying to Langdale, driving to Gibson's, and renting a small boat, asking the cap't to "drive over to those small islands, we're looking for a little white duck." After an hour and a half of fruitless searching, we gave it up and headed back. Gotta try right? No guilty consciences tonight...

G'night

SUNSHINE COAST BIRDING

2010-10-25T19:45:00.001-07:00

Oct 23-24: It's been about 8 months since I was on the lovely Sunshine Coast. Last time I was here I had just broken my scope and seen a lifer (Rock Sandpiper)... also had some awesome sandwiches, celebratory beers, and great birds. So when Lexi Harrington contacted me a little while ago to ask if I wanted to lead a walk for the birding club, I said "YES!" Here's the group that braved the rain and wind:

(Photo by Marcia Mason)

We managed to see some great stuff despite the weather... around 68 species I think! Highlights included 1 THAYER'S and 1 HERRING GULL (both locally rare), a drake EURASIAN WIGEON, a late CEDAR WAXWING, a calling VIRGINIA RAIL, several MARBLED MURRELETS, and a PIED-BILLED GREBE... of course many other things but I'm finding it hard to think right now.

Why? Well read my next post!

THANKS to the whole COAST for having me! Your weather is indeed better than Vancouver!

YELLOW-BILLED CUCKOO!!!

2010-10-22T20:43:00.000-07:00

Oct 22: Today I drove to Creston in the hopes of tracking down a reported YELLOW-BILLED CUCKOO. I arrived at Gary Breault's place around 9:30am. He toured me around his fabulous property and showed me where the bird had been hanging out (present since the 20th). It took me about an hour, but finally the bird flew into view (or deep into the middle of a cottonwood I should say). I had to run back to the car for spare batteries (perfect timing right?), and ran into Linda Van Damme (local bird guru) had brought me a piece of plum pie! SCORE! After securing some fresh batteries, we walked back down into the hot-zone and immediately re-found the bird... who came out to pose in the rising sun (2 different angles too)! What a stunner! A lot more cooperative than the timid bird that visited Cawston a few years ago.

If anyone wants to go have a look, Gary is happy to have visitors but would appreciate some notice by email: garybro@gmail.com (also for directions!)

Back in Penticton, 4am to 4pm... quite the road trip today! Heading to Sechelt tomorrow!

All the best,

Russ C

Count update: 367

Oct 17-18: Wood Sandpiper = NO

2010-10-22T20:30:00.000-07:00

As luck would have it, the Reifel WOOD SANDPIPER (BC's second ever I think) showed up for around 5 hours at Reifel on Saturday (Oct 16th). Unfortately, I was in Victoria and decided to wait until Sunday morning to go for it (in hindsight there is no way I could have made it in time anyways).

My friend Colin and I arrived at Reifel around 12:30pm and boy-o-boy were there a lot of people!!! I have never seen so many cars parked at Reifel and back along the road, not to mention the amount of bins and scopes cruising around the outer dyke. According to staff, over 800 people visited the sanctuary that day! Most of which were probably looking for the Woody including a large mob from Washington.

[Photo: Birders line-up, hoping for a glimpse of a mega shorebird]

Although both SHARP-TAILED SANDPIPERS were still present, all those hundreds of eyes could not turn up Mr. Wood.

Colin and I tried again on Monday but no dice. Hopefully he shows up in another couple days!

A few media links

2010-10-09T12:44:00.000-07:00

Ever since I broke the record a few days ago, both local and national media have picked up the story. Here are a couple links:

http://www.cbc.ca/asithappens/episode/2010/10/07/thursday-october-7-2010/

http://www.vancouversun.com/videos/index.html#/Vancouver Sun/B.C.-birder-breaks-record/2pIHb2ToLuy30kaBvNNDZyEknrHeMsYP

I will also be on CBCs "Daybreak" on Tuesday morning (heard at least throughout the southern interior).

Sounds like some of my blog photos will be used in the big Fox production of "The Big Year" coming out next summer.

Take care and have a great Thanksgiving Weekend!

Russ

Top 10 Most Wanted List

2010-10-07T14:39:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

Several of you have asked for a "hit list" for the coming months. Here are 10 species that could turn up soon---

1. Harris's Sparrow
2. Cattle Egret
3. Ash-throated Flycatcher
4. Slaty-backed Gull
5. Little/Black-headed/Laughing Gull (any of these would be nice!)
6. King Eider
7. Tufted Duck
8. Hoary Redpoll (should be findable if I head north in November)
9. Thick-billed Murre (might need to hit Haida Gwaii again)
10. Brambling (keep those feeders busy!)

NEW BC RECORD!

2010-10-05T20:47:00.000-07:00

The morning started off at 2am with a hard thunping on the car-window... apparently it's "not cool" to camp out beside the airport runway on the road to Iona. I retreated to South Van to catch a couple more hours of sleep, then returned to Iona for some dawn birding. After not finding much I decided it was high time to head over to Reifel to search for the reported Sharp-tailed Sandpiper.

Once there it was clear that no Sharp-tailed was present, but since the tide was out... it was time for the waiting game. Mark Wynja, Ilya Povalayev, Larry Cowan, Cathie Barron, Mike and Sharon Toochin and several others showed up, and watched as 4 juvenile PEREGRINE FALCONS took turns diving on the LONG-BILLED DOWITCHER flock. This was hardly an invitation for a wayward shorebird! Things eventually settled down, but suddenly the silence was broken when ILya shouted "KINGBIRD-- FAR CORNER!!!" Apparently he had overheard Cathy talking on the phone with Larry who was on the other side of the ponds, and immediately spotted what they were looking at. An Australian birder by the name of Daniel Mantle had apparently seen it first... YES... a TROPICAL KINGBIRD!!! Greenish back, greeny-brown and somewhat forked tail... Vavoom!

I had the record tied! Or did I? Mike Toochin (record holder) broke news that his record was in fact 364 and not 365... meaning that the kingbird was the breaker, not the "tie-er." After not having seen Mike since early January (at Reifel to boot), here I was standing right beside him after over a week of nervous doldrums, looking at the bird to put me over. Clearly, the "Bird Gods" exist. Poetic right? Haha, I can only thank Mike and Sharon for setting the bar so high; now it's my turn to keep pushing for more...

A few hours later, we managed to see not 1 but 2 SHARP-TAILED SANDPIPERS in the ponds (thanks to help from Rick Wright and Brian Self respectively). Seems like the high-tide was key! A single AMERICAN TREE-SPARROW and a NORTHERN SHRIKE capped off the day nicely.

Wow. Finally I'm here The pressure is off.

Time to go birding.

Russell Cannings
South Surrey, BC

More Vancouver birding

2010-09-30T22:49:00.001-07:00

Over the last two days I've been patroling all the possible Sharp-tailed Sandpiper spots and hoping for some other rarities along the way. Nothing mind-blowing to report yet but here is a sumary of some of the things I've been seeing.

On Wednesday (Sept 29) I started off at Cecil Green near UBC where a few sparrows were in evidence including this nice WHITE-THROATED SPARROW--- an uncommon migrant on the coast.

I checked the sewage lagoons at Iona but only found 2 PECTORAL SANDPIPERS and 40ish LONG-BILLED DOWITCHERS. The highlights here were more of the waterFOWL variety. First I spotted this cute "minima" CACKLING GOOSE. My first of the Fall.

Then later, a single BLUE-WINGED TEAL was a somewhat late find... but weirdest of all was a PURPLE-WINGED TEAL! What is that you ask? Well while writing up some notes along the side of the road that overlooks the foreshore, I noticed that one of the "Green-winged Teals" hanging out with a swarm of pintails and wigeon had obvious PURPLE speculums. As many will know, mallards sometimes show purple instead of blue but I have never heard of any other duck with purple on the wings!!! (at least in North America). As I snuck around to the back of the car to get my camera out, I accidentally flushed the entire flock. UNfortunately I wasn't able to get a photo but I managed to refind the bird in flight and sure enough-- both wings had small purple speculums--- no green! Otherwise this was a "classic" female-type Green-winged Teal. Very odd!

Next up was Reifel where the 2 highlights were massive LONG-BILLED DOWITCHER numbers and close encounters with both the resident SANDHILL CRANES and a group of wild migrants. All together in the outer ponds, there were over 4500 dowitchers, by far the most I've ever seen anywhere in BC. They were all juveniles except for 1 lone adult, and 1 WESTERN SANDPIPER joined the mix.

Today (Sept 30) I returned and all the dowies were still there plus 1 juv SHORT-BILLED DOWITCHER and 1 LESSER YELLOWLEGS. It was interesting to watch a pair of PEREGRINE FALCONS dive-bomb the waders but with little effect. The dowitchers didn't seem too worried even when the peregrines swooped within a foot of their heads.

Other birds of note from today (Sept 30) include 4 WESTERN MEADOWLARKS at Iona, another WHITE-THROATED SPARROW at Terra Nova in Richmond, a RED KNOT at Boundary Bay, and a couple PACIFIC GOLDEN-PLOVERS (also at Boundary Bay). It was neat to spend 4 hours out on the BB mud and get close and personal with the waders and ducks.

Hoping for sharpies tomorrow!

Russ

New Update soon

2010-09-29T21:06:00.000-07:00

Will be updating soon. No new birds to report but a few nice birds and pics from my recent wonderings in the Vancouver area. Also some sad news about my closest friend--- my car Francesca :(

Rocky Point and other coastal spottings

2010-09-21T20:10:00.000-07:00

On Monday I had the great pleasure of joining some of the Rocky Point Bird Observatory staff and volunteers. It is of course a fantastic place to bird, located at the southern tip of Vancouver Island on DND (Navy) Lands. A mixture of scrub, old-growth oak/fir forest, grassland, marsh, intertidal, and open ocean meet for a great variety of spectacles both avian and otherwise. Of course, because I was there, we had "one of the worst days ever" in terms of birds caught (this is a banding station of course)-- at 13. Still, there was lots to look at including hundreds of BAND-TAILED PIGEONS (pictured feeding on arbutus berries), several hundred TURKEY VULTURES kettling around the islets before heading south over the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and good numbers of accipiters and the odd Red-tail mixed in. I also got to see my first HUTTON'S VIREO in the hand!

Back on the mainland, today-Tuesday, I suddenly realized that I am once again sick... aw man... thought I could fight it. Turns out 5 hours of sleep each night combined with sleeping in a car and birding in the rain everyday is not good for you. Therefore I decided to head back to the Okanagan to recoop... and of course, a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper shows up at Boundary Bay.

Hmm....

Decisions, decisions...

RUFF............. check

2010-09-19T19:31:00.000-07:00

Beautiful bird eh? I was a little worried about this guy as I found out about it when I was in Revelstoke. Luckily this juvenile decided to stick around for a 3rd day in Sooke (southern tip of Vancouver Island). Got great looks from only feet away over a 5 hour period.

All in all a great day of Island birding today, looking forward to visiting the Rocky Point Bird Observatory tomorrow then who knows what next?

Also... because of a counting error (I counted Least Sandpiper twice on the blog list), I'm back at 364. Will have to re-do the list soon.

Keep on birding in the free world!

Russ

Another drive for the ages... yawn.

2010-09-16T10:10:00.000-07:00

SEPT 13th

I started off today "pishing in the bushes" at every pull-off in Pacific Rim National Park. Heavy rain had hit the coast over the course of the previous two days and warblers were everywhere. By 2pm I hadn't turned up anything "rare" but was quite pleased with the abundance of warblers... quite the spectacle. To put things in perspective, in one parking lot alone (North end of Long Beach), I bumped into a mixed migrant flock containing:

130+ Yellow Warblers
65+ Orange-crowned Warblers
3 Townsend's Warblers
1 Wilson's Warbler
1 Common Yellowthroat (a bit out of place high in an alder!)
1 Yellow-rumped Warbler
2 Pacific-slope Flycatchers
2 Warbling Vireos
1 Hutton's Vireo (is that a good bird in the Tofino area? I wouldn't know)
4 Ruby-crowned Kinglets
10+ Golden-crowned Kinglets
20+ Chestnut-backed Chickadees
1 Caspian Tern (okay, this guy was sitting on the beach... but close enough)
[Townsend's Warbler says 'hello' at eye-level]

Pretty good parking lot list and that's not including the bushes which contained 5 sparrow species, 4 thrush species, and some very young Pacific Wrens.

That's when the bombshell hit: "20 Forster's Terns at Duck Lake"

WHAAAATTT??? They're back? Or did they never leave and I just missed them? Not wanting to waste any time, I hopped in the car, drove to Nanaimo, caught the 7:30pm ferry to Horseshoe Bay, then drove through the night to the Okanagan, slept on the side of the road in Richter Pass from 2am to 6am, then drove to Creston, making it to Duck Lake just after 10am.

"NO TERNS TODAY"

Those were the words of local birder Gary Breault who had heard from Linda Van Damme (who tipped me off in the first place) that I would be around, and he had hit Duck Lake in the morning to scout for me... why are people so nice!!! Unfortunately however, there were no terns at the usual spot at the south end of the lake. This is where the advantages of being "local" come in. Gary told me that the terns usually disperse to the north and that I would have a good chance at finding some if I walked the railway bed up the west side of the valley. I thanked him for his help and set out. I hadn't got very far however when I picked up a flock of terns in my scope. Sure enough 15 FORSTER'S TERNS were feeding in a tight group at the north end of the lake. Eventually they came close enough to feel good about the ID and then continued further north and out of site.

YIPPEEEEE!!!! Like the Black-necked Stilt, Bay-breasted Warbler, and Philadelphia Vireo before it, I had considered the tern as a massive bungle on my part... a missed breeder... but here they were! Just as Gary and Linda had predicted! Now I'm only 1 away from tying the record!

Thanks to Linda and Gary and all the other Creston birders who have kept me informed over the last couple weeks! And now I hear that Harris's Sparrow is an annual visitor??? Might hear from me again soon!

After a celebratory sandwich at MUGWUMPS, I hit the road again... finally getting back to Penticton around 5pm.

I just hope no one finds anything rare in the next 48 hours... I need rest people!!!

Why not another pelagic?

2010-09-16T09:05:00.000-07:00

In the days leading up to September 12th, birders kept asking me: You've already seen all the regular stuff, why blow money on ferries and another pelagic when you can't anything to your list?

Two answers:

1)Pelagic birding is awesome

Because a) the birds themselves are unique, interesting, and therefore AWESOME. And B)----See reason #2-------

2) Every trip is different. Therefore even though I have seen all the usuals, there is always a chance of seeing something UNusual. And you're not going to see anything UNusual unless you GET OUT THERE.

Oh and maybe there is a third reason too... I'M DOING A BIG YEAR! Everybody who has done a serious big year in an area that boasts a coastline, knows that "victory lies at sea." Anyone can chase down an Indigo Bunting coming to someone's feeder, but if I told you to "go find a flesh-footed shearwater" (after all, there are probably hundreds off the coast of BC as I type), you would be hard-pressed to succeed.

I guess what I'm getting at is a general big year strategy. The late summer and fall is probably the best time to get out on the sea because birds dispersing from the south (e.g. most shearwaters, south polar skua, etc.) are mingling with northern breeders heading south (e.g. jaegers, phalaropes, etc.). Here's a mathematical formula to explain what I'm trying to get at:

BIG OCEAN (Pacific) touching 4 continents + no physical obstacles + ability to fly hundreds of miles in a day + WINDY!!! + workable 10x42s = unlimited possibilities.

So if you're doing a big year and you're not kicking up rarities in the weedy fields behind you're house, I would suggest going on as many pelagics as possible! Just look at what has been reported off BC in the last few years: Slaty-backed Gull, Lesser Nighthawk, Hawaiian Petrel, Murphy's Petrel, Solander's Petrel, Parakeet Auklet... and on and on.

Of course it makes things easier if you're not prone to seasickness... but a little extra "chum" never hurts!

Perhaps this picture from my most recent trip can illustrate my point:

LAYSAN ALBATROSS-- a much anticipated lifer for me, my 13th albatross species for the world, and #363 for the year in BC!
[ALL PHOTOS ON THIS POST COURTESY OF BEN LASCELLES-- who kindly sent me some of his pics since I was too much of a sissy to bring my own camera... it was pouring rain most of the day okay??!!]

Here are couple more photo highlights from Sept 12th out of Tofino (full report below):
[Sabine's Gulls]

[Fork-tailed Storm-Petrel with lunch]

[Buller's Shearwater-- a lifer for many on board]

[Black-footed Albatross mob]

***Once again, BIG THANK YOU to Ben Lascelles for the great photos***

Trip summary taken from my post to the BCVIBirds site (because I'm lazy):

Hi all,

I have just returned from a local Tofino pub where 17 other seabird enthusiasts
and myself celebrated a very wet but successful day out on the waves. I had the
pleasure of joining a bunch of attendees of the World Seabird Conference (held
in Victoria this year)--in today's case: a mixture of French, South African,
British, and American birders--on what turned into a 9 1/2 hour pelagic.

We had to deal with a steady drizzle for most of the day which kept us soaked
and for the most part, unable to use out optics. Luckily however the birding
didn't drop off and we were very fortunate to run into a fleet of fishing boats
towards the end of the day which boosted some of the numbers and provided for
excellent views of many of the usual species. Ironically, our bird of the day:
a single LAYSAN ALBATROSS was not among the hundreds of Black-foots tailing the
trawlers but floating by us earlier on in the day. This bird had very sooty
underwing parts so could possibly be a sub-adult? Here is the day list in
rough tax. order:

Anas duck sp. 300+
Harlequin Duck 12
Surf Scoter 50
Pacific Loon 1
Common Loon 3
Red-necked Grebe 30+
LAYSAN Albatross 1
Black-footed Albatross *300+
Northern Fulmar *2,500+
Pink-footed Shearwater 250+
Buller's Shearwater 2
Sooty Shearwater 100+
Fork-tailed Storm-Petrel 40
Leach's Storm-Petrel 2
Peregrine Falcon 1
SOUTH POLAR SKUA 2
Pomarine Jaeger 3
Parasitic Jaeger 6
Sabine's Gull *200+
California Gull 750+
Herring Gull 30
Heermann's Gull 100+
(prob.) Common Tern 1
Sanderling 50+
Western Sandpiper 1
Red-necked Phalarope 15
Red Phalarope 1
Ancient Murrelet 2
Marbled Murrelet 3
Pigeon Guillemot 30+
Common Murre 50+
Rhinoceros Auket 30~
Tufted Puffin 4
Cassin's Auklet 600+

All this rain seems to have brought in a lot of migrants. Both this morning
before the trip and this evening walking out of the pub I can hear that the
trees are alive with YELLOW WARBLERS. Will have to check the bushes carefully
tomorrow morning!

All the best,

Russell Cannings
Tofino, BC

Operation PTARMIGAN: Needle Peak style

2010-09-15T15:43:00.000-07:00

SEPT 9:

Well it was already September and I still didn't have a White-tailed Ptarmigan on the year-list. Ptarmigan are in some ways a good bird to be "missing" for a year list since they stay in the same place all year. The problem is that they are very hard to find in THAT place and once the snow comes... well you get the picture. I needed to bag this chicken before October, and I was happy to have some highly motivated ptarm-hunters along--> Jess Findlay, Connor Stefanison, and Devin Mackenzie. We met up in Burnaby at 6am, then headed off up Hwy 5 north of Hope where Fraser Valley expert Dave Beeke had seen them last September, a place called "Needle Peak" opposite the well-known "Yak Peak" near the old Coq toll-booths. We started up the trail around 8am and immediately I realized how driving in cars and sitting on boats for several months does not equal good cardio conditioning. The trail up the mountain is in good condition, it's just that it's STRAIGHT up... makes for a quicker trip I suppose and you don't need a 4x4 vehicle to get to the parking area.

In the spruce, hemlock, and fir forest we picked up HERMIT THRUSHES, a single SWAINSON'S THRUSH (of the olive-backed interior race), and CHESTNUT-BACKED CHICKADEES. We were all a bit surprised when a single BOHEMIAN WAXWING flew over calling; quite an early record for southern BC?

[photo thanks to Connor Stefanison]
Once into the alpine MOUNTAIN CHICKADEES, a couple bonus BOREAL CHICKADEES (we ended up missing Black-capped for the grandslam... how often does that trio happen eh?), flocks of juv CHIPPING SPARROWS, and a NORTHERN HARRIER flushed off the trail in front of us. In fact, it ended up being quite a good day for raptors, with 2 or 3 RED-TAILED HAWKS, the NORTHERN HARRIER, 2 NORTHERN GOSHAWKS, 3 COOPER'S HAWKS, 3 SHARP-SHINNED HAWKS (all accipiters were juvs), a MERLIN, and an adult GOLDEN EAGLE.

At the top of the first ridge the trail splits; you can either head to the left up towards Needle Peak itself or go down a ridge to the right which then pops up to a small lake and another ridge. Dave Beeke told me that he has had ptarmigan at both ends but that they have been more reliable along the last spine before the needle (pictured).

So we headed off to the Needle! No ptarmigans unfortunately but Connor found a few feathers which pushed us on, all the way to the top (a bit of a scramble) where breathtaking views gave us a look at the misty landscape on all sides. A large flock of HORNED LARKS swirled below us while PIKAS and called from the boulder-slopes. While eating lunch we were visited by this inquisitive little guy:

(Short-tailed Weasel by Jess Findlay)

By the time got back down to the trail fork it was already 3pm. We were tired and the clouds were looking menacing but we still didn't have that ptarmie! So, we struck out for the alpine lake, took a break (pictured)then split up and scoured the hillside.
[surveying our handy-work-- Needle Peak in the back]

It didn't take long for Jess to spot one!!! YEEEEAAAHHHH BABY! A whole family.

[Mom above]

[juvie above]

[Jess and Connor get so into the art of photography that large gashes to the leg (from crawling over granite boulders) go completely unnoticed]

There were five young guys with mom in all, we were all quite stoked (if you will).

On the hike back down we ran into a couple of SOOTY GROUSE (more young'ns too).

Didn't get back to Vancouver until around 8 o'clock at night-- but what a day! Sleep well-deserved!

Sept 7-8: Vancouver birding

2010-09-15T15:13:00.000-07:00

After snagging the GREAT EGRET near Harrison Mills I met up with Ilya down around Boundary Bay where the birding was fairly good. Shorebirds were fairly light on the ground but a single MARBLED GODWIT and a few RED KNOTS kept things interesting. The two best birds out on the dyke though were a single VESPER SPARROW (hindsight note: was still there 3 days later), and a fly-by PARASITIC JAEGER-- both new Vancouver birds for me.

After birding the Bay, we joined Cathie Barron, Mark Wynja, and a group from Ontario, at Brunswick Point where we hoped the high tide might bring in the Bar-tailed Godwit to the pilings. No such luck with that bird, but as you can see we enjoyed a fabulous sunset and a flyover BARN OWL.

Sept 8: Today while birding Reifel, Ilya and I got a call from Peter Candido who was looking at a BUFF-BREASTED SANDPIPER at Bounday Bay. We raced over there but unfortunately could not immediately find it amongst the 300+ PECTORAL SANDPIPERS. Eventually however, on our walk back to the car, I spotted the little devil hiding behind an old shoe! (pictured-- #361!)

There was also a BLACK TURNSTONE present, my first for "The Bay" proper.

Thanks Peter!

Ptarmigan hunt tomorrow...

Sept 7: Great Egret at Harrison Mills (Eagle Point Regional Park)

2010-09-15T15:10:00.000-07:00

Thank you to Rick Toochin and Murray Brown for helping out with directions, and to everyone who called me about it... I was trying to relax in the Okanagan of course but couldn't miss out on this beauty!

A few more new ones!

2010-09-10T11:07:00.000-07:00

In the past few days, things have been rolling along nicely--- Great Egret, Buff-breasted Sandpiper, and White-tailed Ptarmigan have all been snagged. Will post photos and stories ASAP.

Good birding!

Russ
(362)

Thursday-Friday-Saturday: Epic S@#% hits the fan

2010-09-06T14:19:00.000-07:00

After scoring RED KNOT at Boundary Bay, I was looking forward to my first ever Tofino pelagic trip. YES I had done quite well on a recent coast-guard trip but I was still missing Buller's Shearwater and well-- you just never know what you might see.

When I got to Tofino, George Bradd of "Justbirding Tours" informed me that the pelagic would go ahead not the next day (Wednesday) but the day after (Thursday). That worked out well because when I got to my friend Natalie's place at the Middle Beach Lodge, a "Jungle Party" was in full-swing and I felt obliged to take part... who knows maybe even past midnight?

Spent the next day strolling the beaches and "pishing in the bushes." Nothing out of the ordinary other than a very bold PECTORAL SANDPIPER poking around on Long Beach.

On Thursday morning I awoke bright and early, and met the rest of the gang (a mixture of Canadians, a Brit, a German, and guides- Adrian Dorst and George Bradd... oh yes and Skipper Michael). On the way out of the harbour we glassed some big numbers of resting HEERMANN'S GULLS as well as an adult WESTERN GULL that was a very good candidate for the southern "wymani" subspecies (very dark-mantled). After about 25miles of very little, everyone was starting to get worried that the trip was a bust but then someone spotted a SOUTH POLAR SKUA. We put on a chase and as we neared the bird, I noticed its target: a floppy shearwater with gleaming white underparts and a distinctly patterned back-- BULLER'S SHEARWATER! The skua dove, hit the buller in the back than pulled up straight into the sky, fanning his tail and flashing his white wing patches like a showy WW1 dog-fighter at an airshow.

Albatrosses (Black-foot pictured) soon showed up with 20 or more passing us over the course of the day. We also ended up seeing 5 skuas for the day, a great number. TUFTED PUFFINS too showed well, and both species of phalarope joined a few groups of FORK-TAILED STORM-PETRELS dining on the micro-organisms on the surface.

Back in protected waters we had great looks at all 3 cormorant species including these BRANDT'S CORMORANTS (brownish one in the middle was being actively fed by his parents).

Happy with my Buller's Shearwater, I started a casual drive home but when I reached Port Alberni, a text from Ilya changed everything: BAR-TAILED GODWIT at Roberts Bank.

AAAHhhahahahhaha!!! I made a mad dash for Duke Point and somehow (thank you bird gods and ferry gods!) was allowed on the boat even though I arrived 1 minute after the scheduled departure time. The lady at the toll booth said it well, "you're on the ferry don't worry. I've radio-ed down there so they know you're coming so you don't have to drive like a mad-man(I guess she must have watched me on street cams as I approached the terminal!). They had to re-open the gate and put-down the ramp, but I was on! Who knew that BC FERRIES catered to Big Years?

Only problem is that getting the 5:45pm ferry from Duke Point to Tsawwassen doesn't guarantee me seeing a rare bird, and perhaps more importantly, it doesn't guarantee light. A delay getting the ramp working in Tsawwassen didn't help either... so I didn't arrive at Brunswick Point (near Ladner, BC) until 8:15ish-- long after sundown. Not one to waste my miracle ferry incident, I huffed and puffed, running as fast as I could down the dyke carrying my scope until I couldn't run any longer. Not knowing exactly where the bird was supposed to be and assuming that Ilya and Co. were long-gone I went off trail and sploshed through the muddy sedges to the foreshore. The bright lights from the coal port helped a bit, but other than Glaucous-winged Gull and Mallard, I knew there was no hope of my IDing a rare shorebird since I couldn't even hear a Black-bellied Plover (the godwit was supposedly hanging out with several hundreds of them). A few AMERICAN BITTERNS barked from the marsh, and I managed to ID a few more ducks and a CASPIAN TERN.. but alas no barwit. Dejected, and getting destroyed by mosquitoes (I thought I swore that Leech Lake in the Kootenays would be the last time!?), I retreated to the dyke, which is when I spotted the silhouette of a man toting a scope.

"Is that you Dale?" Ilya had mentioned that Dale Jensen stayed after him and Carlo left.

"Russell?" Yes it was Dale. Apparently he had stayed until 8:30pm with the bird in the scope... waiting for me to come! THAT DESERVES A BIG THANK YOU--- THANKS DALE! Unfortunately it was too dark for me to see where he was or for him to see me. And of course eventually it was too dark to see the bird in the scope so he gave up. Amazing dedication, I only hope I can return the favour somehow... maybe by finding a massive rarity this fall?

Here's a picture of Roberts Bank, can you see the godwit?

So of course the next day (Friday), I met up with Ilya and Avery Bartels and we birded the SW portion of the Fraser delta, finding a few nice migrants but hoping mostly for the godwit once the tide came up. At Reifel Refuge we ran into this interesting character:

It's obviously got some wigeon in it.. maybe crossed with a mallard or a gadwall? Then a bit of leucism mixed in?

Anyways, we spent the next few hours sitting at Roberts Banks praying for something good to happen, because as far as we could see... there were NO shorebirds let alone a rare asiatic godwit. But then eventually, birds started to trickle in bit by bit until Ilya announced "I've got it!" and everyone rejoiced (including me... you better believe it... pheeew!). Pictured below, the godwit is the one spreading its wings... I know, not a great pic!

I stayed at Ilya's place that night and was getting ready to head back to the Okanagan in the morning when the phones started ringing about a possible Orchard Oriole in Parksville. After talking with the discoverers who said that it had been in French Creek (north of Parksville) for two days, I knew I wouldn't be going to the Okanagan today! After phoning around, Tom Plath and Kevin Neill joined Ilya and I for the twitch and we got the next ferry from Tsaw-Duke Point. On the drive the terminal, Ilya and I decided to stop briefly at "the scrape" (a small wetland only visible for southbound traffic on Hwy 15)-- boom HUDSONIAN GODWIT!
[Below I have attempted to outdo the poor quality of the barwit photo with this hudwit. Note the smooth grayish colour and long bill]

So the 4 of us finally get to French Creek around 3pm or so, and after 3 hours of hard work we still have not seen it. "Not looking good" someone says. Okay no one said that but we were all thinking that. The young Chris Stephens showed up, and BAM finds the bird in a place we had checked 100 times. I almost broke my ankle running over there but managed to obtain good views of the bird perched in the open in the sun for about 5 seconds before it flew down behind another bush. Unfortunately, Kevin didn't get onto it until the last second so we search... with no luck unfortunately until the sun went down.

Chalk it up though! That's a great one for the BC life-list (less than a handful of historical records) let alone the year list. Here's me showing some positive attitude with Chris Stephens the MVP for the evening.
(and NO that is not Sleeman's Cream Ale between my legs... it's Honey Brown)

(why are we kneeling?)

And in an effort of team unity, Ilya and Tom sport the same jackets (you woudn't know that it's past midnight!):

Got back to Vancouver around 1 in the morning, then drove to the Okanagan a few hours later (stopped at Blackie Spit of course for the LONG-BILLED CURLEW and 2 MARBLED GODWITS-- 3 godwits in 3 days baby!).

Now I need to decide whether to drive to Cranbrook for Indigo Bunting, or Harrison Mills for Great Egret...

Until next time,

Russell Cannings
Penticton, BC

CONUT UPDATE: 359 (perhaps tomorrow I will be only the second person to reach 360 in BC). It should also be noted that I have now seen more birds this year in BC than the rest of my life combined (I think I was at 358 in BC?). WOW, what a trip.

HAIDA GWAII

2010-09-06T12:55:00.000-07:00

The ferry crossing was quite smooth and sunny (a rare occurrence in the Hecate apparently). In amongst a flock of HERRING and GLAUCOUS-WINGED GULLS, I picked out a WESTERN GULL—a nice bird this far north. The first half of the crossing was fairly quiet but once we got closer to the Charlottes, SOOTY and PINK-FOOTED SHEARWATER numbers started to pick up, and a few nice birds came into view including 2 adult YELLOW-BILLED LOONS (pictured--click to enlarge), a lone BLACK-FOOTED ALBATROSS (apparently extremely rare in the Hecate), and another nice adult LONG-TAILED JAEGER.

So, after arriving in Skidegate and buying a ticket for Alliford Bay and almost forgetting to pick up my big pack... I was on my way. The only other walk-on passenger was an attractive young girl (apparently orginally from Calgary but now a Sandspit local-- a bit of a change?) who apparently had a truck parked on the other side. Just as I was about to pop "the question" though, a Harley-driving "old friend from back in the day" butted in and offered to drive her up the hill to her car. Damn, too late... we were already at the terminal and a sign read: "foot passengers must wait until all vehicle traffic has cleared before exiting." That meant NO RIDE for me. I eyed up the car closest to me, trying to gauge whether or not they might offer a ride... but their backseat was filled with bags and 5 or 6 noisy chihuahuas so that was a no-go. "Ah well," I thought. "At least it will be a scenic walk."

After all the cars and trucks rolled away I was suddenly all alone on an empty road. Just me and the hemlocks. I noticed a flock of TOWNSEND'S WARBLERS and was about to check them more carefully when the rumble of a V8 Cummins Turbo Deisel engine suddenly broke the silence, and rounding the corner was 'pretty local girl' (I can't remember her actual name) in her black Dodge Ram (clearly the vehicle of choice on Moresby Island).

"Sorry for cutting you off back there, you want a ride?"

"Ummm... well... yeah I guess" "How far is it anyway?" (lier, I knew it was 12km)

"Pretty far," she said.

"Yeah okay I might as well. Thanks!"

She dropped me off at the marina, still 2km walk around the bay to where I had booked a couple nights at "Captain Ron's Guesthouse and Hostel." As I neared the spot where GoogleMaps had directed me, I noticed a handmade sign in front of a normal-looking house. It read: "GAP RON" except the wooden "G" looked like someone had tried to file it down to look like a "C" and the "A" was an upside-down V. Was this "Captain Ron's Guesthouse?" It looked like a house, for sure, but a guesthouse? I asked an old lady working in the "Bun Wagon" (a burger trailer) if she knew where Captain Ron's was. At first she stared at me like I was speaking Flemish or something, then said (in her stereotypical "old lady that has lived in the boonies for a long time" voice), "Captain Ron's?? There's no such thing. I've lived here for over 30 years and ain't never met a guy named Ron... hang on a minute, I think there's a sign down the road that says, 'GAP RON.' Maybe that's what you're looking for."

I thanked her and walked back down the road to the little pink house, knocked on the door and was immediately accosted by 8 chihuahuas, YES the same chihuahuas from the ferry. This was indeed Ron's place. His mother answered the door and hollered at her son to come down. Ron came over and showed me to my quarters-- basically his basement where another German backpacker named Sebastian was also staying (side note: apparently Sebastian's dad is a big-time birder back in Germany). Despite the fantastic-looking website -- complete with pictured of the man himself--(http://www.captainronsguesthouse.com/scrapbook-photos-of-haida-gwaii-us), the guesthouse is a bit of a "project in the works." Lots of cleaning and renovation to be done, but I will say that it is comfortable, cheap, and Ron is Ron: quite the character. He seems to know eveyone in Haida Gwaii including the dude who cut down the Golden Spruce... in fact Ron claims to have been initially accused and arrested for the crime before Thomas Grant Hadwin faxed in his confession. Apparently the chainsaw had been purchased under Ron's name (living on the Haida reserve in Old Masset at the time). You get the idea... as colourful as his language is and all groaning about his various health issues, he has a heart of gold. He treated Sebastian and I to dinner every night, took us out fishing for Pink and Coho Salmon on the Copper River (photo), and gave us bikes to ride around on.

But I wasn't in Sandspit for the fish or for socializing (that stuff is to keep me sane). I was hear for birds, rare birds more particularly which Sandspit has a great reputation for. As a flat grassy peninsula jutting out into the stormy Hecate, and surrounded by rain-forest, many lost birds are attracted to the sandy spits, mudflats, washed up kelp, grassy airport, and berry-producing shrubs in the area.
(Below: grasslands surrounding Sandspit airport)

Among the rarities list for this area are mouthwatering names like: Steller's Eider, Red-legged Kittiwake, Wood Sandpiper, Rustic Bunting, Yellow Wagtail, and most recently: Least Tern.

I'd be happy with any one of those! But first I had to check my fortune at the only business in town: "Dick's Wok-in."

Wow I'm on a roll!

I got out to the tip of end of the runway; I was hoping for golden-plovers and buff-breasted sandpipers but apparently dry weather has kept birds out of the fields. Instead I keyed into a strange bird that flushed off the trail in front of me. It took a few more flushes to figure it out, a new year bird and one I didn't expect until September: LAPLAND LONGSPUR.

The next day I met up with local birder and pastor, Peter Hamel. [Incidentally, Captain Ron also laid all the flooring and carpeting in Peter's church up in Masset-- renaissance man!] He toured me around the spit showing me just where to be relative the what the tide was doing.

Unfortunately there were very few shorebirds around today, but we did have great looks at a couple juvenile PACIFIC GOLDEN-PLOVERS (pictured), and just my luck-- a mega rarity from the south-- a MOURNING DOVE flew past off the ocean getting Peter extremely excited. Aw man! Why not a turtle-dove or something?

On the Sunday, my last full day in the Charlottes, rain was threatening but I made another trip out to the spit and was rewarded with 5 AMERICAN GOLDEN-PLOVERS (3 adults and 2 juvies all banded together). Otherwise, the only other difference from the day before was that there was only 1 Pacific Golden-Plover and a BAIRD'S SANDPIPER flew in for a close look (pictured).

It rained for most of the day but when the clouds lifted a bit, I went for a walk around the golf-course, checking through large groups of TOWNSEND'S and ORANGE-CROWNED WARBLERS for things like Bay-breasted... yea right. But how neat is that? I could never say that in the Okanagan: "trying to pick through a flock of Townsend's for something cool." That IS COOL... what a smart-looking bird! Anyways, headed back to Ron's after more rain came in and watched the original 2 episodes of "X-Files" on VHS and learned all about breeding Deer-faced Chihuahuas from Ron. Apparently incest is okay in the dog-breeding world as long as it only happens 3 times. Or something... anyways, I must admit I was impressed with how "deer-like" some of his chihuahuas were.

Flew out of Sandspit the next morning, bound for Vancouver (don't worry the government is paying for it!). Managed to see some RED KNOT that evening with the help of Ilya Pov and Carlo G.

The smell of Fall is in the air... must find more birds.

Count update: 355

Make or Break Time: My Seabird Cruise

2010-09-06T11:07:00.000-07:00

AUG 17: I am sitting alone in “Ken’s Chinese Restaurant” in Port Hardy. Tomorrow afternoon I will board the coast-guard ship VECTOR and set out on a 9-day cruise over to the Scott Islands then up into the Hecate Strait and finishing in Prince Rupert. I open up my fortune cookie and can’t help but smile.

It reads:

“THE TIME IS NOW”

AUG 18: This morning I birded the harbor-front in Hardy Bay. Lots of BLACK TURNSTONES milling about with half-a-dozen RUDDY TURNSTONES and a single SURFBIRD mixed in. LEAST SANDPIPERS, GREATER YELLOWLEGS, and a lone LONG-BILLED DOWITCHER are also in the area but inevitably my binoculars swing out to the waves; RHINOCEROS AUKLETS, MARBLED MURRELETS, PIGEON GUILLEMOTS, and a noisy family of RED-THROATED LOONS are all offering a quick teaser for what is soon to come.

After lunch I met up with Dave Smith from CWS who is one of the main reasons I was able to come along. I will be conducting volunteer seabird surveys while he looks into mapping out marine wildlife reserves in the Scott Islands. But that’s only a small part of the cruise; the CCGS VECTOR, one of two Pacific vessels designated for scientific research along the BC coast will also be housing 5 other marine biologists studying the seafloor. The have brought with them a small remote-control sub (R.O.V.) that will document the various biological aspects down on the bottom. They are mostly interested in the sponge reefs of the Hecate Strait… can’t wait to see what they find!

We eat dinner and go through the safety procedures and general tour of the vessel, then finally around 7pm we head out—bound for Triangle Island!!! Before it gets too dark to see, I manage to get 1 yearbird: a single RED PHALAROPE. Then a pod of ORCAS cruise past us… off to a good start!

AUG 19: I woke up at 5am, hoping to get an early start to birding… turns out in late August it doesn’t get light until 6:30! So instead I head down to the “mess” for some breakfast, served up by a grumpy but also extremely hilarious Croatian man known as “Mikie.” Throughout this trip we would all be spoiled with unlimited amounts of great food… good thing there was also a small gym on the ship!

After breakfast, I headed up to the Bridge (aka “The Wheel-House”) which offers the most panoramic view on the ship. The skies brightened, and I could clearly see it!

The fabled TRIANGLE ISLAND! The most important seabird colony in British Columbia, housing literally millions of alcids and other seabirds including Tufted Puffins, Rhinoceros Auklets, Cassin’s Auklets, Fork-tailed Storm-Petrels, Pelagic Cormorants, and Common Murres. As we approach I can see that there is a steady stream of birds heading from the island out to sea. Mostly puffins and murres, but there are also several thousands SOOTY SHEARWATERS rafting up in various areas with a few PINK-FOOTED SHEARWATERS mixed in. Out of nowhere a PEREGRINE FALCON glides over to our ship for a closer look, then the best bird of the day…

In amongst a groups of birds sitting on the water, closer, closer, yesssss…. Umm,… YESSSSS!!! A gorgeous adult HORNED PUFFIN!!! Certainly a prized bird in BC, there are only 1 or 2 pairs on Triangle so to pick one out of the 10,000+ puffins passing by the boat was quite a thrill. Soon other year-birds too came into view: a single BLACK-FOOTED ALBATROSS (light-morph adult pictured), then a few FORK-TAILED STORM-PETREL (a long awaited lifer), and a very pale juvenile LONG-TAILED JAEGER! Perhaps most interesting for me was a lone SHORT-TAILED SHEARWATER mixed in with all the sooties. These guys are more regular up in the Aleutians and generally don’t build up in numbers in BC waters until the Fall. They are very similar to sooties, differentiated only by a darker under-wing pattern and some very subtle physical differences—smaller bill, more bull-necked and rounder head… and yes, apparently a shorter tail. This bird also showed a relatively pale throat, and to my eye, it flew a lot higher than the sooties and flew with more hurried wing-beats. I have heard claims that flight-style can be used as a diagnostic feature in some cases but I’ll certainly have to study a lot more to see for myself if this is true.

Anyways… back to the BIG YEAR already!

AUG 20: Got some great birds today! (Mainly because we headed out to the shelf-edge about 10 km SW of Triangle) Out there a couple fishing boats where trawling for lingcod and had attracted a righteous swarm of seabirds. As we approached I picked out a FLESH-FOOTED SHEARWATER (another lifer) closely shadowing a PINK-FOOTED SHEARWATER… I can see why some consider them conspecific. They really had the same proportions and overall flight “jizz,” only one was browny-gray and white and the other was chocolate-black. Okay sorry… another tangent…

Oooo! What’s that on the horizon? A jaeger? No, short-tailed and BIG. SOUTH POLAR SKUA!!! Watched him chase around a Pink-foot and actually tackled the poor shearwater into a wave before moving on empty-handed. Perhaps the best bird of the trip flew in next: a MURPHY’S PETREL! Any pterodroma petrel is awesome in BC, but this was really nice. I have seen lots of similar petrels in the South Pacific, but this guy was thinner-looking and very gray overall. Some of you may recall the mega-bird—Solander’s Petrel—seen last year by Sharon Toochin & Co. The Murphy’s is a very similar bird but has a small head and smaller/thinner black bill, thin-pointed wings, a wedged tail that is more narrow than in Solanders, and the underwing is more uniform. Solander’s on the other hand often has a more brownish cast, white flashes in the underwing, and is more bulky-looking overall. This bird also had a noticeably pale chin which also points towards Murphy’s. Unfortunately, as with most birds on the trip, I was not able to obtain photographs, choosing instead to concentrate on studying birds in the field as much as possible before they disappeared. For instance, if I started spending hours trying to get a good puffin photo, I might miss an awesome bird flying past on the other side of the ship. So for about 14 hours of the day, I ran back and forth up on the Bridge and out on deck, trying to ID every speck within 500m…

More RED PHALAROPES today mixed in with RED-NECKED PHALAROPES, and later in the evening we cruised even further out to sea, where Dave and I were treated to an adult LONG-TAILED JAEGER, many groups of HUMPBACK WHALES, a BLUE SHARK, and a big OCEAN SUNFISH.

(BELOW: Dave's scans the waters off Triangle)

Although Dave and I were seeing some very cool birds, I still felt like we weren’t getting the numbers that should be possible at this time of year. Over the course of the trip there were a lot of very dull stretches where almost nothing was around. I know “Big Blue” is never predictable, but I felt like if we could only get a little further offshore we would start running into more things. For instance, on the entire trip I did not see a single Sabine’s Gull and only had a handful of COMMON TERNS and one ARCTIC TERN.

I can’t complain though, and I must admit that although the ocean was barren most of the time… that evening was the exception. After dinner we continued out to sea for a stretch and on the horizon I could make out hundreds of tiny dots skipping across the waves… LEACH’S STORM-PETRELS!!! As we got into “the zone” things got… well they got, surreal. Around Triangle Island there are thousands of alcids, a little further out you run into albatross and fulmar, and shearwaters. Out here, at least on this night… all you could see—for miles—were storm-petrels. I was only able to make observations for around an hour and a half, but in that time I estimated that I saw over 13,000 Leach’s (150/minute) and 1,000+ Fork-tailed Storm-Petrels! The waves were absolutely alive with these tiny relatives of the albatross. And like I said, the weird thing about it was that there were no other birds of any kind…

AUG 21: The only year-bird today was an immature PARASITIC JAEGER. I also noted 3 adult LONG-TAILED JAEGERS, and over 90 BLACK-FOOTED ALBATOSS (61 of which sat around our boat for most of the day… presumably hoping to score some grub. There were also several hundred NORTHERN FULMARS loafing about)

Here, a groups of albatross and fulmars check out the ROV, hoping that it’s some sort of fishing device.

AUG 22: Another quiet day but had a few highlights—finally my yearbird POMARINE JAEGER (completing the BC skua grand-slam) and another LONG-TAILED JAEGER bombed past us on an otherwise quiet day. As Dave and I sat around checking through the mass of albatross and fulmar that had once again settled at our stern, Dave said musingly, “you would think that all these birds would attract something good.” At that instant (no joking), I spotted a small black-and-white shearwater coming right at us—MANX SHEARWATER I exclaimed… even the first mate and chief engineer got to see it in the bins as it made a couple loops around us then headed out. Formerly a mega-rarity in the entire Pacific (most breed in the north Atlantic), this species is being seen with increasing frequency off California and as far north as Alaska, suggesting the possibility of a small Pacific breeding colony. In fact, a few years ago, one was recorded calling over Triangle Island at night—probably prospecting for a roost site if not a breeding burrow… who knows???

AUG 23:

This morning we awoke to rainy Queen’s Sound near Bella Bella and the Inside Passage. Not a lot of birds to see here but lots of sponges and corals beneath the waves. In the evening a big storm came in from the south, creating 5 meter swells in the Hecate Strait. Instead of hiding out in Laredo Sound the captain decided to have some fun and we spent the night pitching back and forth in the middle of the Strait. Luckily I don’t seem to get seasick but boy, did some other people on the boat! That night before dark I saw another FLESH-FOOTED SHEARWATER.

AUG 24: The waves are still pretty big today; a SNIPE of some sort came out of the fog and made a few circles of the boat hoping to land… an Asian vagrant perhaps? Looked like a Wilson’s to me. We did have both BLACK TURNSTONES and SEMIPALMATED PLOVERS land on deck for a bit, and a pair of LESSER YELLOWLEGS visited briefly… no lost passerines though.

AUG 25: Today is totally different, flat calm in the Hecate Strait and gorgeous sun! All 3 jaeger species seen today, and another Flesh-footed Shearwater. After dinner, the crew got out for some jig-fishing.

They caught halibut, lingcod, and several kinds of rockfish which we ate on the last few evenings.

During our jigging session, an adult PEREGRINE FALCON caught a juvenile RHINOCEROS AUKLET and proceeded to pluck it and eat it.

At first everyone was really excited, but then things got a little “gross” when the falcon ripped off the auklet head and dropped it down onto the deck.

AUG 26: A relatively quiet but pleasant day out in the Hecate with a few brief periods of excitement when another MANX SHEARWATER flew past (off Bank’s Island), and several flocks of 1000+ Red-necked Phalaropes mixed with 150+ Red Phalaropes passed us offering up nice side-by-side views of the 2 ocean-going shorebirds.

A group of 500+ PACIFIC WHITE-SIDED DOLPHINS capped off the day nicely.

AUG 27: Today we arrived in Prince Rupert, where after saying my goodbyes and thanking everyone for the great opportunity, I hopped on the ferry to Skidegate--- on Haida Gwaii (QUEEN CHARLOTTE ISLANDS). When in Rome right? If I’m doing a big year, I figured I may as well head over there as I don’t visit Prince Rupert too often. I boarded as a foot passenger and planned to take another ferry to Alliford Bay on Moresby Island once I got to Skidegate, and hitch-hike the 12km to Sandspit.

Sorry for the long delaaaay!

2010-09-01T16:44:00.000-07:00

Things have been crazy recently with a 2-week coast-guard cruise, a few days on Haida Gwaii (Queen Charottes), some shorebirding, and currently I'm in Tofino.

Will update in the coming weeks with all the adventures... stay tuned!

Russ

Sooke pelagic cut short but still a couple new ones

2010-08-15T13:04:00.000-07:00

Allo allo,

Just got back to Vancouver from a brief jaunt over to Sooke for some seabirding. On Friday I met up with Ian Cruickshank and we headed out to Sherringham Point to scope the waves. Pretty dead out there compared to a year ago when several species of shearwaters and jaegers were visible at almost any time of day. After three hours of watching we had seen only the usual suspects (Rhino Auklet, loads of murres, etc) plus a new year tick: several HEERMANN'S GULLS.

The next day I boarded a whale-watching boat with 12 other salty-souls and we headed out to the mouth of the Juan de Fuca (aka Salish Sea). As expected, we needed to go way out to Swiftsure Banks to get our first taste of tubenoses but alas the wind picked up and we were forced back into the strait. All in all it was a fun trip with the highlights being: 7+ RUFOUS HUMMINGBIRDS all migrating south over the strait, over 20 CASSIN'S AUKLETS (last year we missed them), a single TUFTED PUFFIN, a couple NORTHERN FULMARS (year bird-- pale bird pictured below) good numbers of PINK-FOOTED SHEARWATERS, and surprisingly only 5 or 6 SOOTY SHEARWATERS.

Time for a couple more days of shorebirding (if only we had some rain!), then I'm off on a longer boat trip out of Hardy-- hoping for some good stuff!

Over and out,

RC

A couple more today

2010-08-10T21:43:00.000-07:00

Maybe things are looking up, found a Stilt Sandpiper in Kelowna early this afternoon and then capped off the day by flushing a Green Heron near Grant Narrows this evening!

Time to really stick it out! I'll be on the coast for about a month, fingers crossed!

Russ C
East Van, BC

Ptarmigan hunt update: nope!

2010-08-10T09:12:00.001-07:00

Another missed opportunity

2010-08-09T11:00:00.000-07:00

Well I just got back from a day and a half in the West Kootenays. I had a great time and saw some amazing scenery and lots of birds... just not the ones I was looking for!!! Early in July I phoned a local Creston biologist about Forster's Terns and whether or not I had to worry about getting their right away. His notes indicated that they often linger until September so I thought, "no problem in early August then!"

I linked up with Nelson birder extraordinaire Avery "Gump" Bartels on Friday night, then headed to the Creston Valley Wildlife Management Area on Saturday morning. This place is truly the crown jewel of the Kootenays in my opinion: a vast expanse of rich wetlands surrounded my virtually untouched cottonwood groves and mixed forests (where else can you see ponderosa pine and western hemlock growing side by side?).

Around Salmo I spotted a large group of turkeys in a field; "are those countable?" I asked. Avery insisted that they were wild despite the fence and farm setting. "This is only the second time I've ever seen them there," he said. Feeling kind of dirty but also slightly desperate I ticked them as #335 on the year list. Fortunately later in the day while bushwhacking around the hills of Creston we came across 3 truly WILD TURKEYS running down a quiet logging road (including this fellow).

Anyways, our main targets after the turkeys were Forster's Terns (who have their only BC breeding colony here in Creston at Duck Lake) and Great Egret (which had been seen recently on nearby Leach Lake).

We started off at the old Summit Creek campground where I immediately had flashbacks of getting eaten alive by mosquitoes. Turns out today was going to be a trip down memory lane! Too hot for pants and long-sleeves + no bug spray + Leach Lake = AAAAAAAAAAAAAAARH df;gjbsdlfg'sd!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We first tried overlooking Leach Lake from the Topaz Creek Forest Service Road. No egrets, but plenty of white objects to look at including 120+ AMERICAN WHITE-PELICANS and even more DOUBLE-CRESTED CORMORANTS (these guys are obviously increasing in the area!).

Next we visited the visitor's center for the refuge where of course I was so focused on the target birds I forgot to take a picture of the marsh for the blog. So instead, here is a picture of a nesting BARN SWALLOW which I took while chatting with a student naturalist.

After scouring the main refuge headquarters we headed out to Duck Lake for the terns... that WERE NOT THERE! Disaster strikes again! After missing a couple breeders in the Peace earlier this summer I really couldn't afford to miss another "gimme." BUT, as far as we could tell, the terns were all gone. On our way back to Leach Lake we stopped at the well-known community store "Mugwumps" to pick up some home-made sandwiches and a copy of Linda's "Bird of the Creston Valley." This is a fantastic little guide that is a great pick-up for any visiting birders. Interestingly enough however, the bar-graphs in the guide also indicate that Forster's Terns are reliable until the end of September? Did something crazy happen this year then or what? A local biologist said he had seen free-flying juveniles in mid-July (and also said he hadn't seen any lately) so it seems likely that the entire colony headed south in late July. I would feedback from people in the know!

So anyhoo... screwed that one up! So Avery and I spent the rest of the day walking around Leach Lake getting absolutely obliterated by bugs but still marveling at the high densities of waterfowl and huge cottonwoods. Looks a lot like Revelstoke except waaaay more habitat, I thought. After circling the 2 main Leach Lake units we bushwhacked up the hill to a nice look-out where we scanned and scanned for egrets without luck. We did however spot 2 distant adult TUNDRA SWANS (my best guess) which are probably more notable than an egret at this time of year. But it was not to be! Thoroughly itchy and sweaty, it was time to head back to Nelson.

On the drive back somewhere around Salmo, Avery shouted "Macaw!!!" I knew he had some great ID instincts but this seemed like, well, a bit crazy. Sure enough though, sitting on the telephone wires above the highway was a SCARLET MACAW!!! I Bet Mike Toochin missed this one on his big year right?

Apparently this bird is probably the property of a nearby resident who was recently busted for a massive marijuana grow-up and parrot collection. Therefore, I probably can't safely count it... darn.

Spent one last night in Nelson then headed back to the Okanagan via the Waldie Island Sewage Lagoons in Castlegar, wow a viewing tower at a sewage pond! Castlegar has its birding infrastructure in order!

Back in the OK briefly, looking for ptarmigan this afternoon, then down to the coast for a few months!

Sincerely,

Russ

Done work, time to play!

2010-08-05T15:06:00.000-07:00

On July 30th I completed my last day of bird work in Revelstoke. I had a great time up there and saw lots of birds but now that it's August I reeeeeeally need to start birding the coast. Speaking of which, I just got back from a day or two trip down to Vancouver where I FINALLY caught up with the elusive Dunbar COSTA'S HUMMINGBIRD. After about an hour of watching feeders I (completely by chance) spotted it perched on a clothes-line in another yard. It perched for only a few seconds (enough to get this crappy photo) then disappeared. I haven't heard anyone comment on the bird's vocalizations but this bird was calling/singing fairly frequently during its brief appearance. Similar to the Anna's song but also different in quality and pattern... hard to describe of course! Please let me know if you (the reader) have any experience with Costa's Hummingbird vocalization or even hybrid Costa's x Anna's song as this seems to be an under-documented phenomenon. Aside from the song, the bird appears to be a classic Costa's Hummingbird. The lateral extensions to the gorget aren't extremely long but the prominent white brow and cheek patch stand out, and in the photo you may note the green nape and short wing and tail morphology.

Thank you Dave C for showing me around!

The next day (Aug 3) I teamed up with Ilya Pov for some Boundary Bay area shorebirding. Numbers were decent with lots of Black-bellied and Semipalmated Plovers (1 molting golden plover sp. mixed in; long p-proj. but otherwise Pacific in looks), a few groups of peeps including a few bigger PECTORAL and BAIRD'S SANDPIPERS (apparently recent arrivals).

My only year bird for the day was a lone RUDDY TURNSTONE handing out with the Blackies at the Ferry Jetty (pictured). An attractive dude fo sho!

I tried for Green Heron at Ambleside in West Van the next morning but no luck. Will have to spend more time on this species next week when I come down again for a longer period.

Briefly back in the Okanagan, gearing up for a Kootenays trip: Forster's Tern, Wild Turkey, and Great Egret are the targets!

Russ

Revelstoke Update

2010-07-23T14:12:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

For the last few days I've been working at the Revelstoke Banding Station on Machete Island-- a slightly raised area surrounded by the Columbia River/Upper Arrow Lake. Last year the water was low enough to drive to the station but this year, because of local dam operations, we need to take a boat! Here's a picture of the old road:

Anyways, when we got the station going last year in mid-July, migration was already underway as we were catching Tennessee Warblers and all sort of other things right off the bat. This year, our first week has been very slow with little or no migration evident. Having said that, there have been some very good birds for the station. First of which were 2 SWAMP SPARROWS, both females with brood patches further strengthening my theory that this species breeds somewhere in the immediate vicinity. In fact, one of these birds was caught last year as a very young juvenile so...
(here she is)

As I mentioned migration hasn't really started here, so we're mostly catching birds that breed on the island-- species like: Willow, Alder, and Least Flycatchers, Western Wood-Pewees, Red-eyed and Warbling Vireos, Lazuli Bunting, American Goldfinch, and many Pine Siskins, Yellow Warblers, American Redstarts, Common Yellowthroats, Gray Catbirds, and a few odds and ends such as Marsh Wren, MacGillivray's Warbler, Red-winged Blackbird, and a trickle of Swainson's Thrushes. Most mornings we flush a LONG-EARED OWL from one of the net-lanes which is always cool, and there is a large family of RUFFED GROUSE that have a tendency to fly into the nets. We don't have bands for them so they are released immediately-- an interesting task since every time this happens, the male "ruffs out" and aggressively attacks while giving loud hissing squeals!

My census results have been pretty steady around the low 30s each day but there have been a few surprises including a pair of WHITE-WINGED CROSSBILLS (seen well) that flew over the island a few days ago, and a family group of CHESTNUT-BACKED CHICKADEES that seemed quite happy foraging in a stand of young cottonwoods (weird!).

Today was the big highlight though: a female BLACK-AND-WHITE WARBLER! My first for the Revelstoke area (and 2nd reported this year!). Perhaps a sign that migration is about to begin? Or did she link up with the male seen in early June nearby and raise a family? We actually caught and banded her too:

There have also been a few shorebirds passing over the station although unfortunately (due to the high water levels) there is nowhere to land! Over the last few days I have noted Solitary Sandpiper, Lesser and Greater Yellowlegs, Least Sandpiper, a few Killdeer, and 1 Semipalmated Plover in addition to the resident Wilson's Snipes.

Another interesting bird note: For the second summer in a row a NORTHERN HAWK-OWL is being seen frequently along one of the main hiking trails on Mt. Revelstoke-- a strong suggestion of breeding?

That's all for now folks!

Russell Cannings
Revelstoke, BC

The Great Northern Swing

2010-07-10T11:28:00.000-07:00

On June 29th Ian Cruickshank of Victoria and I set out somewhat behind schedule for Prince George. There we met up with Christopher Coxson who was to join us for the duration of an epic voyage to the extreme northeastern and northwestern corners of the province. I was still recovering from the lack of sleep over the last few days so Chris's parents were kind enough to offer us the living room for a brief snooze.

We rose around 3am and headed out towards Pine Pass. After reaching the Mackenzie junction we realized that the gas station there was not 24-hours after-all... time for another nail-biting "will we make it?" ride, this time through the Rockies over to Chetwynd. But once again we pulled through, this time in my parents's Honda CRV. I had planned to take the tercel but when my Dad saw how much gear we were trying to stuff into the little red car he insisted we borrow a vehicle. For that we are greatly thankful because, in hindsight, I'm not sure "Francesca" would have survived the journey!

After fueling up in Chetwynd we drove down Hwy 52 towards Tumbler Ridge where we stopped into the Brassey Creek Road (site of the bear vs. tent incident) for another attempt at Cape May Warbler. BUT once again we were greeted to the Peace with strong winds and warm sun which did well to mute most birds and make things very difficult. A few note from BLACK-THROATED GREEN WARBLERS and the agitated chips from CHIPPING SPARROWS were about all we could manage in addition to the highlight bird: NASHVILLE WARBLER which I assume is a rarity in the Peace area as I certainly have never seen one here before and I have heard of only a couple others. This bird was foraging silently in the alders along a road edge and because of the brief views I could not confirm whether or not it was an "Eastern" or "Western" Nashville.

With very little birdsong in evidence we continued on towards Dawson Creek where I wanted to put in a strong effort on some big misses from the last trip: Baltimore Oriole and Philadelphia Vireo. Now apparently this has been one of the worst year for orioles in the Peace and from our experiences on this trip I would have to say the same for Philly Vireo, Cape May and Bay-breasted Warbler. Anyways, we walked around the Pouce Coupe Sewage Lagoons, then birded for a few hours near the south end of Swan Lake which is often considered one of the best spots in the province to see both Baltimore Oriole and the vireo... but of course we found very little. In fact we didn't even hear or see a Red-eyed Vireo!!! Usually one of the most outgoing songsters, we saw none-- our only vireo was this curious WARBLING VIREO (photo).

After a quick nap we moved up to the Swan Lake Provincial Park campground where we prowled around some more for orioles... nothing. After a campfire stove dinner we headed out for another round of oriole-searching when we bumped into the birder from Ventura, California who found the LEAST TERN on Haida Gwaii... small world! he informed us that an oriole had been singing quite a bit near the boat-launch just a few hours before we got there... great. We tried some more but no luck.

As the sun was going down we finally had some luck. We dropped by the house of a very friendly couple on the south side of the Peace River near Taylor. Unlike most times when I've visited when there have been 3 or 4 Calliope Hummers and 1 or 2 Rufous, this evening there were more like 20-30 hummers buzzing around! And YES we managed to see at least 1 RUBY-THROATED HUMMINGBIRD! After a few weeks of disappointment, seeing this bird definitely injected some pow back into my blood.

Instead of going to bed, we drove over to Watson Slough after dark to try for Yellow Rail. No dice with the rail but it was nice to hear a NELSON'S SPARROW singing nearby. When we got to Beatton Provincial Park on Charlie Lake the gate was closed so we camped in the parking lot.

July 1rst: Canada Day--- FINALLY a BALTIMORE ORIOLE!!!

Chris woke me up with a pleasant surprise: "Umm Russell I think there's an oriole here." CHA-CHINGGGG!!! Finally !

We proceeded to search the white spruce around the playing fields in Beatton, hoping in vain for a Cape May. We did however see a fair amount of birds foraging down low, so a few nice atlas records kept the spirits up like a ROSE-BREASTED GROSBEAK nest with eggs, several warbler species feeding young, and Ian's lifer BOREAL CHICKADEES. Below is a picture I took of him; I've shown many people their lifer Boreal Chickadee over the years but this has to be the most leisurely tick yet!

We gave up birding for my targets as the winds were just getting too strong. We headed a few hours north up Hwy 97 to Pink Mountain where a 4x4 road leads to the alpine. Up there we experienced some of the strongest winds I have ever come across. It was literally impossible to walk on the west side of the mountain so we hiked along the eastern slope where after an hour or so we stumbled upon 2 male ROCK PTARMIGAN! This keeps my Pink Mountain ptarmie rate at 100% and very happy to see these guys in summer plumage as last year in May the males were still all white.

After Pink, the rain started to set in and the entire drive to Fort Nelson was quite wet and windy to say the least. Funny, last Canada Day I was stuck in a hotel in Fort Nelson waiting for the roads to dry so we could pull one of our work trucks out of the ditch. Here I was again, contemplating why the weather on the east side of the Rockies seems to hate me so much? Nah, it hates everyone I suppose. There are nice days of course, but on a Big Year, as I have found, it rains a lot when you're hoping to hear high-pitched songsters like Cape May and bay-breasted Warblers, and clears right up when you're hoping for a shorebird fall-out.

Anyways, because the weather forecast called for a week of rain we decided to high-tail it out of there and head to the Yukon. Why the Yukon? Because in order to drive into the Haines Triangle (NW corner of the province) you need to drive up through Whitehorse and Haines Junction then back down into BC.

On July 2nd on our drive NW to Watson Lake on the YT border we drove up the "Nonda Creek Corridor" track that leads up to some radio towers near Toad River and just to the south of Mt. McLearn. Not sure what the mountain was called where we were but Jack Bowling had told us that the subalpine was a good spot for Gray-cheeked Thrush and that the alpine on top could produce ptarmigan. We hiked around for a while, playing thrush tapes and beating the bushes for ptarmigan and Brewer's (Timberline) Sparrow but no dice. Lots of AMERICAN PIPITS and GOLDEN-CROWNED SPARROWS about and great scenery though!

We pushed on from Muncho Lake where gas sells for $1.78/litre (!) and pulled into the Liard River Hot Springs around dinner time. If anyone is considering a trip up north I would highly recommend this stop. It's only $10/car to use the pools and the surrounding habitat and scenery is not only gorgeous but bird-rich as well! Yes it is busy with tourists, but there's enough water to go around and it's all natural; no concrete sidings or fancy hotels nearby. We were there in a thunderstorm too which was actually quite a pleasant experience. Didn't pull the camera out during the rain but here's a nice shot Ian took of me birding the canopy from one of the more secluded pools (I think I was trying to sort out an Oporornis warbler mystery)-- it was very cool to discover that both MOURNING and MACGILLIVRAY'S WARBLERS are present here! I was also happy to note that the males from each species sang their own songs and as far as we could tell there was no mixing going on.

Now that's what call birding! Also present were BLUE-HEADED VIREOS, YELLOW-BELLIED SAPSUCKERS, WESTERN TANAGERS, WESTERN WOOD-PEWEES, RUSTY BLACKBIRDS, and nesting MEW GULLS (a nice mix of north-east-west birds!).

We spent that night with long-time Yukoners Gordon and Rose Toole at their great place on Watson Lake. Gordon's claim to fame is that he was one of the weathermen based in Snag, YT in 1943 that recorded the coldest ever temperature in North America (and for the World at that time): -81 F or -63 C. And we complain about -15 in Penticton!!! In addition to being very kind hosts, the Tooles are also Chris's grandparents, what a coincidence right? Outside of the birds, if there is one thing I have enjoyed immensely throughout the course of this "BC Big Year" it has been meeting great people like the Toole's all over the place. Many of whom don't realize just how much of a luxury it is to eat in a dining room and sleep in a bed, spending weeks at a time dining under spruce trees in the pouring rain or even in the bathrooms of highway rest-stops, and sleeping (or not sleeping) in my tiny car or in tents, or on the ground. It's all fun of course, but a big THANK YOU once again to all of those people who have shared their homes and hospitality, and also to those who call me when a rare bird shows up-- it is much appreciated!

So I guess it must have been July 3rd when we rolled into Whitehorse, the capital of the Yukon after a long drive across the territory. We stayed the night at my uncle Syd's place and had a great get-together with other Yukon bird-greats like Cameron Eckert, Jukka Jantunen, and Ted Murphy-Kelly. After prying their brains about the birds of the Haines Triangle we nodded off to bed and woke early again to drive out to Haines Junction. When we pulled into the FasGas there, a young native woman walked up to me and asked, "are you Russell Cannings?" My mind scrambled to understand how she could possibly know who I was. Had my blog suddenly become a cult classic in Haines Junction? Had word spread throughout the bird-world that "the big year guy" might possibly be passing through Haines Junction and this #1 fan had been waiting for weeks just to see me???

"Your uncle just called, he said you forgot all your food"

"Oh..."

Well at least Haines Junction has a "General Store" which gave us enough selection to last for a couple days. We headed due south on the road to Haines, Alaska and passed back into BC around lunchtime. We were not surprised to see storm clouds on the horizon, nor were we psyched out by the wind. Here we were in an unknown place with unknown birds... who knows what could be found... a Smith's Longspur? A Northern Wheatear? A Long-tailed Jaeger?

(photo of the Haines Road)
Plus, despite the wind, birds were ACTUALLY singing... yes unlike the Peace, we could hear birds before we saw them. Right away we started picking up cool birds like AMERICAN TREE-SPARROW, COMMON REDPOLL, and GRAY-CHEEKED THRUSH. ARCTIC TERNS were plentiful around the lakes, and GOLDEN EAGLES soared in and out of the mist overhanging the stony ridges.

We tried to drive to Kelsall Lake but soon discovered some beavers had flooded the road in two section so we took off our shoes and forded these sections and proceeded onto the lake.

(Ian looking well at ease despite the sharp rocks and frigid temperatures of the creek)

(A rainbow rises over Kelsall Lake in the distance. We checked both ends and no small green men, pots of gold, not even a longspur! By the way this is willow-habitat is favoured by the secretive GRAY-CHEEKED THRUSH. Incidentally, it is also favoured by many GRIZZLY BEARS!)

On our walk to the lake we bumped into several WILLOW PTARMIGAN including a male and female with a brood. I was surprised to see the male act so aggressively since most grouse (including Rock and White-tailed Ptarmigan in my experience) males have nothing to do with chick-rearing. Perhaps Willow Ptarmigans are more like quail? Anywhoo, here are some shots of both the male and female respectively.

Absolutely nothing was scoped on the lake so it was great to find a pair of SEMIPALMATED PLOVERS with a chick along the beach as well as 10+ LEAST SANDPIPERS (which breed nearby in the small fens). By the looks of it, more poor weather was on the way so we took shelter in this small shed/cabin originally built by a willow ptarmigan researcher. Today it is used by travelers from around the world--evident in both the guest book and on the walls. As you can see, I left some graffiti of my own.

That night we fell asleep to the songs of "Sooty" Fox Sparrows and Gray-cheeked Thrushes, and of course the constant "gobeck gobeck- gugugugugu!" of Willow Ptarmigans. I will upload a video of one to Youtube and post the link on the side of the blog. As you will see from the video, it was still quite light at 11pm!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqB0jO-Lkvk

We rose early the next morning for a full-day of hiking. Today we wanted to put in some effort for wheatear. With no records for the area it was a longshot, but how many birders hike the rocky upper-slopes of Tatshenshini-Alsek Provincial Park. To get to the high county one must pass through a kilometer or two of 2 meter high willows which is a good way to surprise a grizzly. We whacked our way through the brush yelling frequently, brandishing our bear-with the safety off. Luckily we didn't encounter any large brown objects and soon got up into lichen-clad tundra. Here we found many pairs of SEMIPALMATED PLOVERS, AMERICAN PIPITS, HORNED LARKS, and SAVANNAH SPARROWS. Around the small lakes and braided rivers in the area we also observed nesting ARCTIC TERNS, MEW GULLS, HERRING GULLS, LEAST SANDPIPIPERS, and best of all- several pairs of WANDERING TATTLERS! These guys are at the southern limit of their range and it is such a treat to see them at close range in full alternate plumage, and standing on reindeer lichen and heather instead of a wave-platform along the outer coast!

(I didn't notice there was a second bird until I looked at the photo later!)

Along the barren rocky-slopes up higher we found no wheatears but it was nice to hear a SNOW BUNTING overhead-- a good atlas bird!

We got back down the hill around dinner time and headed back north to the Yukon, stopping only for this obliging GYRFALCON sitting on the side of the road. The nearby ARCTIC GROUND-SQUIRRELS were none too pleased but I think all those in the car were quite happy!

Another night in Whitehorse, then a long drive back to Fort Nelson! Before I get on to more birds, it must be said that the Alaska Highway between Fort Nelson and Whitehorse is dynamite for large mammals. We saw hundreds of WOOD BISON, many many BLACK BEARS, (possibly) 1 GRIZZLY BEAR, lots of MOOSE, a few ELK, 2 CARIBOU, 50+ STONE SHEEP, and I also saw a MINK at the hotsprings and Ian and I got great looks at a FISHER near Dawson Creek. Below are a couple animal photos for those fur-lovers out there!

When we got back into Fort Nelson we were very happy to see that the rain had gone. the wind was still there, but as the evening wore on it died down a little. We birded the Fort Nelson Demo Forest where Jack Bowling had seen both Cape May and Philadelphia Vireo only a few days before. No joy there but we did find CANADA WARBLER and , MAGNOLIA WARBLERS, and TENNESSEE WARBLERS carrying food. Ah yes and something I didn't mention earlier, there are "Eastern" WINTER WRENS all over this area which will soon be split. In the overlap zones around Steamboat in the northern Rockies and Pine Pass further south it is neat to hear both western ("Pacific Wrens") and eastern forms singing side by side. Apparently extensive studies have shown that a split is appropriate so I figured I'd find a few for this year. I understand that the species designation will probably come out before the end of the summer. For those interested, Eastern Winter Wren song is different from the one most of you are used to in that it is less rambling, more structured, often less notes, and has a more melodious quality. The call notes are also different and as you will see in your Sibley field guide, there are visual differences as well.

But we still couldn't find a Cape May or Philly or Bay-breasted to save our lives so we drove up Hwy 77 towards the border with the Northwest Territories and camped at Beaver Lake-- a traditional Cape May Warbler spot (where we had already tried and failed). In the morning we were not completely shocked to find that the wind was still kicking up the trees but we played tapes, pished our hearts out, and tracked down every bird-like object that we could find. After a bit of a lull period when we were detect absolutely zero birds, Chris announced, "a warbler-type thing just flew into that tree." "Probably another Yellow-rump" I said but got out the Cape May song recording once again. I played it and played it... nothing but wind. "Alright, well... let's go" I murmered. "Wait I've got one! The tall spruce!!! Frickin beauty!!!" Chris shouted. Before I could ask, "which tall spruce?" it flew to another tree right in the sun and the three of us were treated to the gourmet Cape May show. Which warbler is supposed to be the candle in the forest? Is it Cape May or Blackburnian? Whatever, this bad-boy lit up the canopy and lit up our bins as we drooled over a great bird and felt the weight of a week of searching fall from our shoulders.

Next we birded the Patry Mainline, a forestry road that is now becoming a busy gas road. I chose this site because last year I had at least singing 12 Bay-breasted Warblers and 3 or 4 Philadelphia Vireos in the span of two days. Surely this year with three sets of eyes we could find at least 1??? We tried for several hours without success. Maybe it's the wind? The time of year? A bad year? Obligations down south meant that we didn't have a lot of extra time. We decided we would return early the next morning and go for broke, then drive the 1,700 km back to the Okanagan around 8am.

We camped out in the wilds near the Fort Nelson River that night and were treated to the chorus of a wolf pack that came within 100m of the tent after we tried out some howls of our own. A particularly deep-toned individual, probably the alpha-male, obviously took issue with our trespass and threatened us with some hearty growls... which did the trick. I don't think any of us wanted to make the evening news on our last day of birding the north.

We woke up early the next morning, and... no wind! No rain! This will be perfect! But wait, something is missing. NO BIRDS. It is early July we are in beautiful mix old-growth aspen/spruce forest and there is not a single bird singing! Okay there goes a swainson's thrush... a few minutes pass, "did I just hear a sapsucker in the distance?" "Oooo a chipping sparrow! Maybe there IS hope." We birded that road HARD for 3 hours and could not find a single vireo let alone a phily, and NO we did not get any of the supposedly abundant Bay-breasts.

"It must be the time of year" we concluded. But how could it be this bad? Birds are still singing in the Okanagan where it's 38 degrees! Birds are still singing like crazy in the Haines, why is Fort Nelson and the Peace for that matter so dead??? I talked with Mike Boyd who had been up around Dawson, Fort St. John, and Hudson's Hope and he bailed early on his trip because of the same problem: no warblers, no vireos.

"Time to bite the bullet and scram I guess." For those planning a big year in the future or just a trip up to the Peace, perhaps you should make sure to go in early and mid-June. I don't know if this is normal but it seems very odd. By the sounds of it, I just happened to do my big year during one of the worst Baltimore Oriole, Cape May Warbler, and Philadelphia Warbler years in recent memory... but that's understandable. I was fully prepared to miss a few breeders based on annual fluctuations but to hear it so absolutely quite I KNOW the birds are there is something else. Not sure what the deal is with the Bay-breasted Warblers. As far as I know, no one has seen or heard a Bay-breasted in BC this year. That's quite a decline considering that they were fairly common in appropriate habitat all over the Fort Nelson area last summer and in some years they breed around Fort St. John. Cape May Warblers go up and down but they seemed practically absent from the entire Peace this year (based on the reports of a few birders I've talked to).

I'll stop complaining now, but really... what happened this year? So YES I missed both Philadelphia Vireo and Bay-breasted Warblers. Two supposed "gimmes." This will certainly hurt my chances at the record but I'm not out of it yet. Still a few easy ones to get yet and you never know what the fall will bring.

This was an incredible trip all-told and with the BAIRD'S and SEMIPALMATED SANDPIPERS at long last) we found at the Fort St. John sewage lagoons, my BC year list has been bumped up to 332 just 6 shy of my casual total last year. With luck, I'll be over 360 by the end of September... but we'll see. The going gets tough here.

Until next time!

Russ C

New MyNaramata article posted

2010-07-10T11:18:00.000-07:00

http://www.mynaramata.com/show859a/Birder_Nears_Record_Year

Sorry for the lack of blog-action lately!

2010-06-29T11:42:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

I must apologize for the lack of writing lately. I have been extremely busy with working and rarity chasing to the point of absolute exhaustion. Time to rest? No TIME TO DRIVE TO THE YUKON AND BACK DOWN INTO BC (HAINES TRIANGLE) NEAR THE ALASKA BORDER. Yes perhaps I am crazy, but since I just drove to Tofino and back (and didn't see that mega-bird Bristle-thighed Curlew) I figure I may as well go and get some "easy" breeders right? Enough of these unreliable things, I need a bird on territory to get me out of this slump. Oh and did I mention I drove from Golden to Vancouver for a Costa's Hummingbird, missed it, then drove back to Revelstoke to work the next morning!!! In my delirious drive home I came up with this feeble joke: (read in an Italian accent)-- "Costa's Hummingbird? More like- 'a COST-A-LOT OF a-MONEY!'" Hilarious at the time, not so much as I type.

Anyways, perhaps things are looking up as I just saw a SAGE THRASHER singing at White Lake! Finally!!! If only the Black-necked Stilts would come out of hiding in the same way.

Time to drive to Prince George though, I will give a full update in a couple weeks. Hang in there!

Clark's Grebe and other good birds

2010-06-17T07:57:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

On my way back to Revy from days off I stopped in at Salmon Arm and managed to finally pick out a CLARK'S GREBE from amongst the many Westerns. I tried a couple times back in May without success so it was nice to finally see one in the fading June light. For those who are unfamiliar with Salmon Arm, there is actually a regular but tiny breeding population of Clark's at Salmon Arm (from 1 pair to 3 or 4 pairs depending on the year). And of course there are a few mixed pairs and no doubt some hybrids now to make it interesting!

Yesterday while working around Revelstoke I had the luck of getting great looks at both SHORT-EARED OWLS and LONG-EARED OWLS!!! Always a treat to watch those guys. The long-ear was especially sweet since up until yesterday I had only heard them.

Off to Bush Arm again in a couple minutes!

Russ
p.s. Hoping my camera will be fixed soon!

Early June--Bush Arm and Okanagan Birding

2010-06-15T12:45:00.000-07:00

I have recently returned from a fabulous stint in the middle of nowhere, or is it the middle of everywhere? 5 days near the Alberta border in the gorgeous "Bush Arm" of Kinbasket Lake (about 90km north of Golden on a logging road), allowed for some great birding. A co-worker and I camped along the Valenciennes River (a main tributary of the Bush River and later the Columbia), and spent most of our time doing bird surveys along the river and reservoir for BC HYDRO. A lot of our working area is just barren mud and gravel but a few spots as well as everywhere in between can be very productive. Most days I would get up super-early and go out atlassing, then wake up my partner for work, then later in the afternoon we would go for a hike somewhere. Anyways, it was quite nice and we found some good birds for the area (and the atlas!).

Some of the highlights:

-a single YELLOW-BELLIED FLYCATCHER on territory for at least 4 days (will return soon to check on him). This may be the southern most record for this species in the province! I would appreciate any information on other records south of McBride if they exist (picture of habitat included, also a picture of my reaction... the best I can provide when you don't get a photo of the bird! My camera is currently getting repaired so I've just got this tiny point and shoot thing). For those interested in the habitat, it seems to favour a cedar snag and a tall birch snag that jut out of a mixed forest of cedar, cottonwood, aspen, pine, and spruce (mostly young stuff), and as one might expect, the ground cover is fairly moist and is mostly mossy. So far I haven't heard any other birds. This species (like Gray-cheeked Thrush) is probably more widespread in BC than anyone realizes simply because of limited access to appropriate habitat, limited coverage by birders in various regions, and limited experience with their calls and song. For instance, the YB Fly can sound a lot like a Least Flycatcher or even a Hammond's or Dusky to the unfamiliar ear.

Also:

-Several pairs of WESTERN and EASTERN KINGBIRDS (as well as a few migrant flocks- the biggest being 7 EAKIs and 1 WEKI)

-at least 4 singing male LECONTE'S SPARROWS in one spot plus at least 1 female

-Copulating BLACK SWIFTS (lots around!)

-1 possible BLACK-THROATED GREEN WARBLER (haven't seen it yet, it sings classic BT Green song for 90% of the time then switches over to a TOWA-like song every once in a while. This could be a hybrid or perhaps just a Townsend's that sings BT Green song (this has been documented in the Peace). Will continue to pursue this guy.

-1 singing GRAY CATBIRD

-1 female WILSON'S PHALAROPE (keep in mind, I'm in the middle of the mountains!) feeding in a creek (she has been there for at least 10 days and a male was sited a few weeks ago in the same area)

-I also found a neat hidden lake with lots of reeds that seems to have breeding WOOD DUCK, MALLARD, both HOODED and COMMON MERGANSERS, PIED-BILLED GREBE, BUFFLEHEAD, RING-NECKED DUCK, and both rails. Maybe I'll find a Swamp Sparrow if I can find time to check it in the morning.

Much more!

At the moment I'm back in the Okanagan where it is pouring rain (it was baking in the mountains!). Pretty much all my money is gone so hopefully I'll get payed soon and my little car tune-up won't be too pricey! Bird-wise I managed to find a singing GRASSHOPPER SPARROW along the first stretch of the Nighthawk Rd west of Osoyoos. Got great looks. Unfortunately however it seems like the Black-throated Sparrow and Sage Thrashers have moved on. Hopefully mote thrashers will return in late June as they do most years.

I'm afraid a trip to the coast for that Indigo Bunting would really drain the bank so I hope it either sticks around or calls up some friends!

Until next time,

Russ Cannings
Currently in Penticton, BC

p.s. Will probably try for Clark's Grebe this evening in Salmon Arm, fingers crossed... maybe a stilt will show up?

Finally some R & R

2010-06-08T20:33:00.000-07:00

After working in Revelstoke for a week or so, I had some days off so Sam and I explored a bit of the Columbia/Rockies/Kootenays. First we checked out my future work site in Bush Arm (Kinbasket Lake). As you can tell from the following photo it is a breathtaking place and really reminds me of the Waimakariri/Arthur's Pass area in New Zealand. This massive braided-river valley is where I will be spending the rest of June-- not bad eh? It's also where a Black-necked Stilt had been hanging out until the day I went there (I suppose this guy can join Harris's Sparrow as a nemesis this year!). We did however run into a couple LECONTE'S SPARROWS which is always a treat on the west side of the Rockies. Probably annual breeders but how many birders have checked out Bush Arm before?

After visiting some friends in Golden we struck out for Nakusp early the next morning. On the Galena Bay/Shelter Bay ferry I was once again reminded of New Zealand, this time of Fiordland Nation Park... what a breathtaking part of BC! You can't see a single house; mountain meets water in such a spectacular way and there are BARN SWALLOWS nesting on the ferry! (in the photo, look for the brown clump under the captain's bridge) They simply follow the boat back and forth all day; I wonder how long it takes to build the nest!

Once in Nakusp it started to rain, we tried birding around Summit Lake for a bit but retreated to the vehicle after an hour or so and took shelter further south in the gorgeous and CELL PHONE-FREE Slocan Valley town of New Denver. We both really enjoyed this quaint area and met a lot of nice folks. It was a great place to unwind and forget about birds for at least a moment!

The next day we headed back to Nakusp and the "secret" non-commercial hotsprings north of town. This capped the weekend off in primo fashion.

Upon returned to cell range and civilization I now know that by relaxing in Kootenay Heaven I missed out on CHESTNUT-COLLARED LONGSPUR and BLACK-THROATED SPARROW.

Pah! I explored a part of this province I had never seen before, finally caught up on some much-needed rest, and most importantly-- I got away from it all with my special someone and reinforced my belief that this year is not only about a list of birds, but a list of memories and adventures...

what comes next? I can't wait!

RussC
Currently in Revelstoke, BC (tomorrow=heading into the mountains for a few...)

Photo review of the month of May

2010-06-03T15:26:00.000-07:00

As anticipated, May proved to be one of the wildest and most eventful months yet. Below are some photos that I didn't have time to include on the blog earlier:

In order of appearance:

1) Steve Siegel of Miami, Florida filming boreal species near Dutton Creek above Okanagan Falls (although it looks like he is filming a yellow sign). He is one of the people responsible for getting bird footage for the 2011 film, "The Big Year." The plot has nothing to do with me, but if you see any shots of Evening Grosbeak, Say's Phoebe, Calliope/Rufous Hummingbirds, Northern Pygmy-Owl, Gray Jay, Clark's Nutcracker, Long-billed Curlew, or displaying Ruffed Grouse... I was right there! I had the pleasure of showing Steve around the south Okanagan for a day so maybe my name will be in tiny writing at the end of the credits... probably not.

2) 3 Common Terns pose for birders on a piece of wood in the middle of the Juan de Fuca

3) Rick Toochin of Juan de Fuca Pelagics, shovels yummy fish-oil and cheerios into the sea, while the rest of the crew tries not to breath through their noses

4) A Tufted Puffin shows of the plumes to some happy seabirders near Swiftsure Banks

5) 2 shots of a confiding male Spruce Grouse I found while scouting the upper elevations for our BIG BIG DAY

6) The always comical-looking Acorn Woodpecker, so much sweet seeing one in the Similkameen Valley!

7) One of the Great Horned Owl chicks that frequented my parents' back yard for most of the spring

So obviously a great month! There were some misses of course (e.g. Black-necked Stilt) but hopefully all these things will fall into place. Like how come I haven't seen a Semipalmated Sandpiper or Willow Flycatcher yet??? With TIME I guess!

I'm at 316 now which seems very close... but it's mostly a tough slog from here on out! I'll probably still be in the 320s by the end of June, then July might get me into the 330s... August maybe the 350s... then it's one here one there.... a race to the finish!

PEACE!

2010-06-02T14:32:00.000-07:00

On May 25th, Gabe David, Sam Brett, and I set out north... The much anticipated "Peace River Country." Definitely one of my favourite places in BC to bird, as you get a fantastic mixture of northern birds, western birds, and most importantly for the BCers: EASTERN birds.

We left Kelowna a little later than planned, then made a wrong turn in Kamloops--oops-- back towards Cache Creek, here we go! (at least Gabe spotted the trip's only BLACK-BACKED WOODPECKER flying across the highway) Back on 97 we drove straight through the Cariboo and past Prince George (resisted my temptation to check the Shelley Sludge Lagoons)... then finally into Pine Pass at sunset!

A singing dendroica had us going for a bit but eventually we decided it was a wierd TOWNSEND'S WARBLER... drat!!!-- a WESTern bird!

Just a bit further though, through the mountains, and down along the Pine River... "chibek! chibek!" LEAST FLYCATCHER.. okay that's a start, keep it coming...
ROSE-BREASTED GROSBEAK singing! Yeah yeah, ooo YELLOW-BELLIED SAPSUCKER, AMERICAN REDSTART... TENNESSEE WARBLER! The highlight along this stretch of highway though was definitely what Gabe initially described as a "white mammel crawling up the bank." We eliminated Polar Bear based on range and habitat (are cottonwood lowlands good for seals?), but soon we all got a better look at what he had glimpsed-- 2 WOLVES!!! 1 white and 1 darker beast... sweeeet. Now it was too dark to bird so we headed to Chetwynd for a forgettable dinner then set up our tents in behind the bushes at a rest-stop east of Chetwynd. Perhaps not the best place to get some sleep, given the idling semis, BUT a nearby wetland produced a couple singing LECONTE'S SPARROWS which provided a final excitement to the day.

We awoke early the next morning to the songs of more cool (year) birds: RED-EYED VIREOS, BLACK-THROATED GREEN WARBLER, BLACK-AND-WHITE WARBLER, more LECONTE'S SPARROWS (photo), at least 3 UPLAND SANDPIPERS (chasing each other around some nearby fields) and a couple fly-by BLACK TERNS.

Gabe also discovered a hidden-deep hole in the ground right beside our tents... to think we could have been lost forever!

Next we headed east to Dawson Creek, then north up to Fort St. John where we stopped into a few houses around Taylor hoping for good news-- aka ruby-throated hummingbirds. Apparently it's been a bad spring for them according to the hummer-watchers in the area but we stuck around for a bit anyways. More looks at YELLOW-BELLIED SAPSUCKERS, loads of singing CLAY-COLOURED SPARROWS, a BLUE JAY, a single EASTERN PHOEBE, and in the humminbird department-- several Rufies and Callies but no rubies. One interesting observation was of a male CAllIOPE HUMMINGBIRD displaying vigorously to a female RUFOUS. Will have to check back and see if any funny-looking offspring are around later!

The main reason for scheduling this trip in late May however was for shorebirds. I figured this would be my best shot at white-rumped sandpiper since they pass through annually during a small window from late May to early June. When I was up here last year at the same time I had those birds as well as many breeding-plumage stilt sandpipers, and the prairie race of short-billed dowitchers... this year however, a heavy snowfall followed by sunny weather had preceeded us by about a week, effectively clearing out all the shorebirds. The other problem was that every single cell in the north and south sewage works around Fort St. John were high with little edge for peeps. As usual however, it was great to see the EARED GREBES at close range along with a small group of RED-NECKED PHALAROPES (photo). With no further ideas on where to find shorebirds, we decided to check out the Fish Creek Community Forest where I had never been before. It was mid-afternoon with a bit of a breeze so things were fairly quiet, but we did manage some good looks at BLACK-THROATED GREEN WARBLERS, a couple BLUE-HEADED VIREOS, and heard a distant singing OVENBIRD.

Next it was back down to Johnson Road for some more forest birding-- highlights here were a gorgeous male CANADA WARBLER and a BARRED OWL who came in immediately to my call, and continued to whoop it up for the rest of our time there, much to the chagrin of nearby WESTERN TANAGERS, ROSE-BREASTED GROSBEAKS, and LEAST FLYCATCHERS.

For out last stop of the day we headed north to Charlie Lake, where we set up camp in Beatton Provincial Park. While walking to the bathroom I heard a singing BLACKPOLL WARBLER but couldn't track it down, probably a migrant as there didn't seem to be any good habitat for it nearby. After the tents were up we headed down to the lake where a real spectacle was taking place: thousands of FRANKLIN'S GULLS staging!!! It seemed like a scene from the coast with over 6000+ of these forming shearwater-like rafts out in the middle of the lake, accompanied by hundreds of WHITE-WINGED and SURF SCOTERS. The scoters breed nearby on several lakes, but the gulls apparently don't breed in BC at all... it seems as if they party it up on Charlie Lake for a bit, then some head back to Alberta to nest in the marshes!
That night a NORTHERN SAW-WHET called all through the dark and into the late morning-- our second of the trip as one had been calling near Chetwynd as well.

The next morning we slept in a little bit and didn't get to the Cape May Warbler spot until 5am. I'm not being sarcastic either... these guys like it bright and early! Maybe it was too early in the year though because we didn't hear one at all!

Once again the wind and sun picked up-- keeping a lot of birds quiet but we kept on birding of course. While trying to get to Boundary Lake using an old map we ended up on an abandoned road that lacked a bridge over the Beatton River so no dice there... oh yeah and we got a nail in the tire so that was a fun delay. Got the tire patched for free in FSJ-- thanks OK Tire! Then headed toward Boundary Lake on a paved road--- sigh*. Along the Cecil Lake Road a about 10km before Boundary Lake I saw some muskeg on one side of the road and thought we might stop in case of Palm Warbler. We got out of the car and within seconds Gabe got onto an odd call-note and there in the ditch beside the car was a PALM WARBLER! That'll save me some long drives around the gas line of Fort Nelson! There were no obvious roads to Boundary Lake itself so we decided to head south back to Dawson Creek on a road I had never taken before (crossing the Peace River right next to the Alberta Border). Certainly a very scenic route with a lot of birding potential but we didn't turn up too much in the afternoon sun.

We continued along all the way down to Swan Lake Provincial Park along Hwy 2 south of Dawson Creek. Here at sunset we picked up a singing SWAMP SPARROW (first photo is of me and Gabe looking at the sparrow, then the next is me with one boot and one flipflop... I guess I was excited to chase down my first swamper of the year and only got one boot on!

That night we tromped around in the sedge along the south shore of Swan Lake hoping for a nelson's sparrow or better yet- a yellow rail. No luck with those birds but we did pick up some local rarities-- 2 GREAT BLUE HERONS flying by and an AMERICAN BITTERN gave it's pumping display on 3 occassions.

On the morning of the 28th we headed up the southern stretch of 201 Rd nearby and got looks at a couple singing MOURNING WARBLERS in addition to the other usuals. At the Ducks Unlmt. site an ALDER FLYCATCHER sang from the willows-- huh? And back in DC we were surprised to see 200 FRANKLIN'S GULLS fly over Safeway... I guess they get around!

For the last half of the day we poked around the Brassey Creek Road between DC Tumbler Ridge. This is where the trip started getting crazy-- mainly thanks to a large male BLACK BEAR that trashed Sam's tent while we were (thankfully) on a hike.
(and NO we didn't have any food in there!)

This bear didn't really leave either. When we drove up to the campsite and yelled at him, he kinda loped up the hill then stood his ground and huffed for a bit. When we dragged the tents back onto the road to take them apart he walked back down onto the road just a little downhill from us and just stared for a bit. He hadn't been the only big bear on the road tody either so we decided to sleep in the car that night! Not the comfiest set-up in my 2-door tercel, but better than a half-naked encounter with a curious bear.

Woke up the next morning around 3:50am-- this time we weren't gonna let any keener Cape Mays evade us... but it was well below zero (felt like it anyways)and bird song was not plentiful. Once again we figured the CMs just hadn't returned yet. OLIVE-SIDED FLYCATCHER was a new year bird for me though (at long last!), and a tooting NORTHERN PYGMY-OWL and STELLER'S JAY were respectively north and east of their usual ranges. Our failure with Mr. C-May was vindicated however when we stopped the car for a listen near the bottom of the road (where it hits the highway)... from up on the hill in a stand of old aspens we heard an explosive-"tip-tip-topateepo!" CONNECTICUT WARBLER!!! We bailed out of the vehicle and loped up the wet hill and into the woods. Gabe played a recording and right away the bird flew in and gave us startling looks at this seldom seen Oporornis!!! Oh and I forgot to mention, right after we saw that bear, my camera ceased to function. Perhaps in fear, or perhaps due to all the times it got "bumped," all I could get it to say was "lense error," the darn thing wouldn't even turn on. So ya, no COWA shots! [This lack of a functioning camera would prove very frustrating later on in the day.]

Back up north and over to Chetwynd for breakfast... fantastic omlettes but can't remember where we got them... too tired. We fueled up with gasoline and food, then headed NE up the Jackfish Lake Road towards the fabled area known as "Del Rio" (ooo, exotic name!). Last year I spent a few days surveying the area for rare marsh species but didn't manage to find one of Mark Phinney's favourite spots for Yellow Rail etc. This time I had a map though-- printed off the internet--- what could go wrong? The map showed a road paralleling some railroad tracks, leading straight to the wetland. Took us quite a while to find the railroad tracks, even with the GPS, but when we got down there, the "road" my Dad and I had scouted out in the virtual world, was in reality more of a grassy trail through some trees and small marshes. Not to be outdone, and despite driving a tiny V4 car fully loaded with campers and supplied, we attempted to drive this path/track/quick-sand marsh/mountain range for a couple kilometers. Not sure how we made it that far, but eventually decided there was no way this was the right way to get to such a popular birding location. We backtracked, and finally discovered using the road-atlas, that a 2-lane graded gas road went straight to where we wanted to be... slightly frustrating...

Anyways, we drove right to the area and sure enough there were some great patches of sedge etc etc. We played around in the aspen woods waiting for dusk, and when the sun started setting the magic happened! We started out with point-blank looks at more LECONTE'S SPARROWS, then I heard a NELSON'S SPARROW sing nearby and eventually it popped out for about 10 minutes, singing away- lit up by the blood-red sun! (remember no camera). With the daylight waning, I gave up on any hopes for philly vireo or baltimore oriole (I guess like the CMs, they just hadn't come back yet)... it was time to turn our attention to one final target: Yellow Rail.

Easier said than done, I had spent 2 whole weeks last year surveying for them and only had 2 on the very last day in a place where one wouldn't expect. But the habitat here looked good, so Sam and I (Gabe didn't have boots) headed out into the marsh brandishing "rail stones" and with ears cocked to the max. We flushed lots of LECONTE'S SPARROWS and heard a few more SWAMP SPARROW but nothing responded to our clicking noises. Then on the far side, we stopped to talk about where to go next when a "tick tick tik-tik-tik" broke the silence with two insect-like phrases. We both looked at eachother to make sure we weren't imagining it. YELLOW RAIL! But what do we do? Poor Gabe who has never seen one and declared the species his main target for the trip was stuck back on the road out of view. We decided to rush back to the road, quishing and squashing the whole way, trying to avoid tumbling into the cold water. We exclaimed our triumph to Gabe, then Sam, in an act of ultimate kindness and birding solidarity, gave Gabe her boots. The two of us struck out back towards where we had heard the bird. In my mind I couldn't help but worry if I had dreamed up the bird... was it actually there? It only called once or twice... last time they called all night... please call again, please call again! We arrived at the spot and Gabe played the tape, no response. After a few failed play-backs I tried out my rock-clicking again-- this time it responded almost immediately! "Okay now let's see it" Gabe said. I cracked a nervous smile and we proceeded to walk in the direction of the calling bird. It had stopped a few minutes ago and despite a few passes of the area we turned up nothing. "Try your rocks again, it seems to prefer that to the real thing," Gabe suggested. I pulled out my lucky stones (chosen carefully from the roadside), and starting ticking. After about 20 seconds I heard something small crash into the sedge just a few meters from where I was standing. "Psssst---" I gestured in the direction of the noise... "I think it just landed there" I whispered. Gabe started slowly walking towards me, then suddenly the bird flushed from his feet and landed about 5 meters away... "__________!" (insert excited profanity here) The bird landed in view, then dashed over a tuft of grass and dissappeared into a small depression. We approached slowly and gawked in awe as the adult breeding-plumaged YELLOW RAIL let us get within a meter and a half!!! I guess its defense mechanism is to hunker down and hope that it's golden-streaked plumage would blend in to the old sedge grass. Well it would have if we hadn't watched it go there first. We were able to watch it continuously first in daylight then eventually in darkness. Was it on a nest? Why was it staying put? We watched it preen, we watched it stretch its wings, and cock its head when it heard our boots crunch... WOW. Now the question was, would it flush if one of us went back to get Sam? Our experiment proved that it was quite happy there, and Gabe-- who was in rail Heaven/Cloud Rail whatever... offered to return Sam's kindness my sacrificing his bare feet to the cold marsh water. I ran back with the boots and left him with the 2 lights since one was dying. Sam must have been a little worried to see me running back, huffing and puffing, no flashlight, with Gabe's boots but no Gabe. Was she expecting me to yell, "Gabe's gone! I saved your boots though, we need to get out of here!!!"? No, I explained the situation and once again we trekked out there and luckily the rail was still there! Sam got fantastic lifer views in the flashlight and even saw it catch an insect of some sort! Gabe was getting a little shivery and the tevas we gave him didn't really help. We stuck it out though, hoping to observe some rare unknown yellow rail behavior... perhaps it would lead us to a pot of gold or grant us wishes? OK, I think I was getting REALLY tired at that point... remember how we woke up at 3 something in the -10 or whatever? What a day though, a truly magical birding day from the connecticut to the nelson's sparrow, to the rail... and we were still running into bears everywhere. At some point (I lost track of time) the rail just decided it was time to go and took off, showing his distinctive white secondaries. THANKS BUDDY!

We walked back to the car and Gabe changed into some dry clothes. "Should we sleep in the car again or take turns driving through the night to Blue River to check out this Indigo Bunting?" The answer was obvious, I woke up at a gas station somewhere outside of Prince George, and took over the wheel. Evidentally we should have purchased some gas at that gas station because I realised somewhere out in between PG and McBride that we wouldn't be able to drive 130 KMs with the dial hovering around EMPTY. Not much we could do other than pull over at a rest-stop with 93 KMs to go and hope that someone (at 6 in the morning) had a jerry can or could give one of us a lift to McBride. Luckily we met a friendly couple who offered to escort us as far as the car could go, then they would drive the rest of the way to McBride and bring us back some gas. So we piled back into the car and set out: 80km left and the dial has been well below empty for 20kms now... 60km left-- we're still going? ... 35km left- well at least they won't have to drive as far now... 15km left, "NO WAY IS THIS ACTUALLY HAPPENING... YOU CAN DO IT FRANNY (my car)... (insert rubbing of dash motion)... 2KM left!!! We can do it! Into the station, "wwweeeeewwww!!!! YEAAAAH!!!" The other patrons filling up must have thought we were drunk out of our minds. 110+ KMS on empty... thank you 1993 Toyota Tercel! "Must have been the new air filter I bought ya eh?"

Okay this blog entry is really starting to go on here. Basically we made it to Blue River in one piece and met up with the very friendly owners of the Bone Creek Wilderness Retreat" where the bunting had been seen. Unfortunately we missed out on it, but did see a male COMMON GRACKLE which must be a good bird for that area! Made it back to the Okanagan, and now I'm typing this in Revelstoke, BC where I've just started field work.

In addition to my broken lense, my back-up camera as well as both Gabe's and Sam's were out of batteries... I guess Yellow Rails don't show when you're ready. But I'll take it!

What a crazy trip and I can't wait to get north again! First though, I need to make some money... at least Revelstoke and Golden have their fair share of birds. Picked up MAGNOLIA WARBLER and COMMON NIGHTHAWK yesterday, waiting for black swift and willow flycatcher to finally catch up with me!

Until next time,

Russ Cannings

NMT BIG DAY (75km cycled)

2010-06-01T19:32:00.000-07:00

Today (May 23), I was joined by Sam Brett, Ana Milner and Ryan McIndoe. Our starting point for this cycling "Big Day" was KM25 on the 201 Rd above Okanagan Falls. As you can see in the photo, it was a little wintery up there with light snow in the air and on the ground and YES it was very cold. We didn't have a thermometer with us but it was certainly below zero at 5am when we got our first bird: RUBY-CROWNED KINGLET. The rest of the morning up high was very quiet, much different from previous mornings leading tours and doing the driving big day; there were hardly any birds singing! Instead of the usual 30+ hermit thrushes around Rabbit Lake we heard only 1 singing, we missed white-crowned sparrow and Pine Grosbeak, and not a single spruce grouse was heard wing-capping. We did however hear some female SPRUCE GROUSES calling close to the road, and heard the NORTHERN PYGMY-OWL that has been very reliable up there of late. No woodpeckers early on but eventually down lower we heard RED-NAPED SAPSUCKER, PILEATED WOODPECKER, and NORTHERN FLICKER. We missed "Willy" but were happy to see MACGILLIVRAY'S and WILSON'S WARBLERS close at hand, many TOWNSEND'S WARBLERS, a couple BOREAL CHICKADEES, and other common larch birds like CHIPPING SPARROWS and PINE SISKINS.

Once we got down lower I decided to take an alternate route to Vaseux Lake, both for old time's sake, and to save us a couple KM (at this point I was still suffering from my cold that caught me on the Red-throated Pipit chase... wasn't sure how long I could survive). The alternate route was of course the old Irrigation Creek Road (aka McIntyre Creek Rd) which branches off the 201 (Shuttleworth) around KM5.5. This road used to be one of the premier birding roads in the province but the fire of 2003 wiped out a large portion of the pine forest while other areas have been logged, plus it has been decommissioned to the point that few vehicles can pass through. Anyways, there are still birds there and we had a great ride down! No gray flycatcher this year unfortunately, but lots of LAZULI BUNTINGS singing, a family of CANYON WRENS poked around the rocks right beside us in the box canyon, NASHVILLE WARBLERS sang in the riparian draws, and pine specialists like RED CROSSBILL, CASSIN'S FINCHES, PYGMY NUTHATCHES, and CLARK'S NUTCRACKERS displayed themselves in a convenient and pleasant manner.

Further down along the Vaseux cliffs we heard several CHUKAR calling away somewhere up on the rocks; our first LEWIS'S WOODPECKERS of the day chased each other around, and from up on the hill we picked off some of our first waterbirds of the day on Vaseux Lake including a COMMON LOON, 5 EARED GREBES, 1 CANVASBACK, and many REDHEADS.

Next we cycled over to the Vaseux boardwalk where a VEERY called repeatedly, joined by chattering MARSH WRENS, witchitie-ing COMMON YELLOWTHROATS, and overhead-- WHITE-THROATED SWIFTS swooped and screeched.

Now it was time to head south to River Road where we found Mr. BLACK-CHINNED HUMMINGBIRD perched on his usual wire; like last year we were skunked once again at River Road on the chat front... where does he go? Around the bend at Hack's Pond, RING-NECKED PHEASANT, BLACK-HEADED GROSBEAK, and SORA were added to the list among other things... now it was time for the big slog!

All the way down to Rd. 22 north of Osoyoos, we fought the wind and gravel (okay it wasn't that bad but my bum was pretty sore!) We rode the dyke along the Okanagan River and picked off new species for the day such as WOOD DUCK, EURASIAN COLLARED-DOVE, CEDAR WAXWING, YELLOW-BREASTED CHAT (at least 3 along there!), and EASTERN KINGBIRD. Upon finally reaching Rd. 22 we notched BOBOLINK, LONG-BILLED CURLEW, YELLOW-HEADED BLACKBIRD and NORTHERN HARRIER in quick succession, bringing our day total close to 130... pretty good considering out total last year was 118! We still had a couple stops though-- first was Deadman Lake where loads of waterfowl continued to be found, plus WILSON'S SNIPE and WILSON'S PHALAROPES. I scanned and scanned for the previously noted common goldeneye, semi plover, and least sand but no dice. Back to rd. 22 we headed south along Black Sage Road to the look-out over Osoyoos Lake: like most years, boat traffic was heavy on the Victoria Day weekend and little was left on the lake other than a few RED-NECKED GREBES and a distant loon in basic plumage... possibly a yellow-billed??? Too far...

When we returned to Rd. 22 Carlo Giovanella and his gang informed us that the goldeneye, plover, and peep were indeed still at Deadman Lake... uuuurg! Back on the saddle for the back-track and finally after 20 minutes of concentrated scanning with the bins (no scope), we found the LEAST SANDPIPER and the female COMMON GOLDENEYE... no plover though. So, that brought us to 135 around 4:30pm. We were all pretty bushed at that point and figured our total was a competitive one, so opted against heading up hill again to search for some of our big missed... bad yes I know: Lark Sparrow, Hairy and Downy Woodpecker... etc.

But a fun day all in all and mostly great weather! (75+KM cycled) THANK YOU SO MUCH to all of you who supported my DAY with a donation/pledge to the Baillie Fund and the Vaseux Lake Observatory. I believe it is still possible to contribute at:

http://www.bsc-eoc.org/support/birdathon/index.jsp?targetpg=donate&lang=EN&number=36054

ACORN WOODPECKER (got it!)

2010-05-24T22:08:00.000-07:00

Just when I thought I was on my way north, my Dad got word of an ACORN WOODPECKER in Princeton. Hopped in the car with Dad and Sam and got to Princeton by about 3:10pm. We were a little confused at first because we had the wrong address but when I called the home-owner (the bird was frequenting a suet feeder), we realized that we were right outside her house. She also mentioned over the phone that "the bird is here right now." WHAAAATT!!!?!?!? I threw open the door and sprinted across the yard and peaked around the side of the house... yup still there! Back to the car for the camera and this time through the front door. What a great bird and what a feeder! I'll post more photos later of the woodpecker and the other feeder visitors when I get home from up north!

May 21: BROAD-WINGED HAWK!

2010-05-21T19:34:00.000-07:00

This morning I observed an adult light-morph BROAD-WINGED HAWK along with David Riedel, Agnes Lynn, and Mary Robichaud; it was circling high over Rabbit Lake (way up the mountain above OK Falls, BC). This is my first BWHA for the Okanagan and a very rare bird in the spring in southern BC. I managed a couple photos before it disappeared into a cloud!

We also had an adult FRANKLIN'S GULL fly past us at Vaseux Lake! Not bad!

Sponsor my NMT Big Day!

2010-05-20T18:36:00.000-07:00

This Sunday I'm doing another Big Day, this time all by bike! Please support my Baillie Birdathon by donating at the following link. You can either pledge per species or a flat rate. The proceeds will go to both the Baillie Fund and the Vaseux Lake Bird Observatory (which could use some extra $ thanks to government cutbacks to the Canadian Wildlife Service!)

http://www.bsc-eoc.org/support/birdathon/index.jsp?targetpg=donate&=EN&number=36054

Thank you so much!

NEW BC BIG DAY RECORD: 197!!!

2010-05-20T16:37:00.000-07:00

If things weren't crazy and tiring enough, some friends and I recently decided to take a crack at my Dad's Big Day record: 196 species in 24 hours in BC. We didn't think we'd break it right away, and that this would be a good practice run. But sometimes things just go right. We cleaned up in the Okanagan and pick up enough birds on the coast (despite the ugly weather on Wednesday) to smash the record by 1! Here's the story:

(MAY 19)
Our team, consisting of 4 members: Myself, Avery Bartels, Ilya Povalyaev, and Chris Charlesworth began our night in the traditional “Big Day” way... at Tim Horton’s. Unfortunately this Tim Horton’s had a very limited supply of timbits and bagel varieties, and had decided to employ only one, very tired woman for the graveyard shift so our first birding stop for the “Day” ended up being at 3 minutes past midnight... time is ticking! Anyway, our first bird of the day was a calling GADWALL at Robert Lake--- here we soon added a few other species with the help of the headlights including WILSON’S SNIPE, CANADA GOOSE, and best of all- AMERICAN AVOCET. Next we dashed south to Penticton, where Max Lake provided us with some “big-bang-bong... chaching chaching” birding—COMMON POORWILLS calling, juvenile NORTHERN SAW-WHET OWL begging (and seen well in our flashlight beams), both SORA and VIRGINIA RAILS in the lake, and a distant male GREAT HORNED OWL.. A brief stop on the White Lake Road gave us WESTERN SCREECH-OWL, then we were off up the mountains!

We tried for Barred Owls around the Venner Larches without success then dipped on Boreal Owls further up. It was quite chilly up top around Rabbit Lake but eventually the sounds of the first songbirds warmed us up a little bit—HERMIT THRUSHES, VARIED THRUSHES and AMERICAN ROBINS were the first to chime in of course, but soon GOLDEN and RUBY-CROWNED KINGLETS joined in, followed by DARK-EYED JUNCOS and BOREAL CHICKADEES. A flyover MOURNING DOVE was a big surprise in the frigid high country, and a calling SOLITARY SANDPIPER gave us good reason to be optimistic about the day ahead.

After chalking up 48 species by 5:30am, we headed up to Venner Meadows where the sun came up to greet us and warm our frozen bones (photo); here we got onto some more goodies like NORTHERN WATERTHRUSH, THREE-TOED WOODPECKER, and WILSON’S WARBLER (quite a beautiful bird to see singing in a frost-covered willow lit up by the morning sun!). Back down into the Larches we struggled to find woodpeckers but did eventually hear both WILLIAMSON’S and RED-NAPED SAPSUCKERS, and picked up DOWNY and PILEATED WOODPECKERS (notoriously tough birds on Big Days in my experience).

Then we headed down the road to the lower reaches of Shuttleworth Creek where more “Okanagany” birds awaited in the pines: WESTERN BLUEBIRDS, all 3 NUTHATCHES, ROCK WREN, SAY’S PHOEBE, CALLIOPE HUMMINGBIRD, LAZULI BUNTING, and LEWIS’S WOODPECKER to name but a few.

In Okanagan Falls we scoped all 6 species of swallow over Skaha Lake as well as both VAUX’S and WHITE-THROATED SWIFT flying right over-top of us. CEDAR WAXWING was a good pick-up in town, and we were very pleased to see that the 3 HARLEQUIN DUCKS we had staked out on the river were still there.

White Lake produced its most feisty resident: the BREWER’S SPARROW, but unfortunately a concerted effort for partridge and grasshopper sparrow turned up nothing (photo).

Next it was River Road where BLACK-CHINNED HUMMINGBIRD, BLACK-HEADED GROSBEAK, and YELLOW-BREASTED CHAT showed up on cue, then Vaseux Lake really paid off with some solid birds in a short amount of time: CANVASBACK, GOLDEN EAGLE, CANYON WREN, CHUKAR, and RING-NECKED DUCK... some solid day birds to be sure!

A EURASIAN COLLARED-DOVE on Tuc-el-Nuit Rd was #132 and it was only 9:45am! Our luck continued up the McKinney Road where we had DUSKY, HAMMOND’S, and GRAY FLYCATCHER all at the same spot—from the car!

Back and the Hwy and heading south, Avery spotted a fly-by STELLER’S JAY (our only one for the day), then Deadman’s Lake really came through with WILSON’S PHALAROPE, LEAST SANDPIPER, LESSER YELLOWLEGS, HOODED MERGANSER, and COMMON GOLDENEYE (some very good day birds). Overhead we spotted SHARP-SHINNED and COOPER’S HAWKS, and best of all: 2 large flocks of AMERICAN WHITE-PELICANS flying north!

Rd. 22 was also productive with out first BOBOLINKS of the day (and year), a pair of LONG-BILLED CURLEWS, a NORTHERN HARRIER, and 2 PEREGRINE FALCONS. With #154 species at 11:30am we were feeling pretty good! Our luck started to wane a little however, as we failed to locate the long-staying yellow-billed loon on Osoyoos Lake. At least we found HORNED and WESTERN GREBE, and a lone TUNDRA SWAN (which would all turn out to be our only ones for the day).

We gassed up in Osoyoos and high-tailed it to Princeton where we nabbed RUDDY DUCK and BUFFLEHEAD on a nearby lake, then Avery spotted a MERLIN flying over the town!

When we got to Manning Park we made the poor decision to drive all the way out to Strawberry Flats to try and track down a gray jay (which we missed up high in the morning). The wind made birding a bit difficult and the birds just wouldn’t show. FINALLY at Lightning Lakes 2 birds flew in (photo) helping to ease our angst but now we had a 1 hour deficit to deal with.

When we finally got down to the coast, things were not looking good. Yes we had racked up 168 species by the time we rolled into Abbotsford but we were running out of light, the weather looked horrible to the west, and highway construction did nothing to make us feel better! Luckily most of the rain fell while we were stuck in traffic but the wind stayed strong throughout the rest of the day and into the evening. Luckily for us, Ilya Povalyaev was in the car and using his keen knowledge for the birds of South Surrey, we nailed 24 more species in quick succession including WHIMBREL, MARBLED GODWIT, and LONG-TAILED DUCK at Blackie Spit, and COMMON TERN and BONAPARTE’S GULL at Crescent Beach.

All of a sudden, the record seemed within reach. We were losing daylight extremely fast and the wind was blowing hard, but somehow we kept adding birds--- a BARN OWL off the Ladner Trunk Road, BLACK OYSTERCATCHER, BRANT, PELAGIC, SURF SCOTER and BRANDT’S CORMORANTS at the Tsawwassen Ferry Jetty, then we hit Iona with almost no light to spare. We scoped some GREATER SCAUP just in time, then walked the ponds after dark hoping to hear and possibly see some shorebirds. Some NORTHERN PINTAILS were nice new birds, but NO SHOREBIRDS other than a few Spotties showed themselves. Then, Chris spotted a small group of peeps in a wet area right beside the walking dyke!!! Through our scopes we could barely make them out as the light was going way down. If they hadn’t been within 10 meters it would have been impossible! Anyways, WESTERN SANDPIPER and SEMIPALMATED PLOVER were picked out for sure but no dunlin or anything else.

Now with no light, we considered our prospects--- we had 194 species... 2 short of the record. What could we get at night other than Barred Owl? The first answer was “Mute Swan” and sure enough, with the help of our Canadian Tire-issue pit-lamps we lit up a single bird at the Westham Island bridge. #195... now what? Do we sneak into Reifel and try and find a crane? Do we spotlight the rocks at Brunswick Point for roosting Dunlin, pumping bitterns anywhere? It was decided that with our limited time it would be best to go where the birds were “easiest” and where we had a shot at the most amount of species. That meant driving back to White Rock where we walked into Crescent Park and headed for the pond... any wood ducks around? We panned back and forth across the pond... nothing. The wind was really raging now and it was starting to look like we’d reached our limit at 11pm. We started walking the perimeter of the pond and then suddenly heard a crashing noise and briefly saw 2 objects pop out of a bush and then into the ater. “THAT’S IT! THAT’S THEM!” Sure enough, a male and female WOOD DUCK now out in the open! High fives all around, we had tied the 15-year old record. Ilya took us to a corner of the park where he figured we had the best chance of Barred Owl. Under the windy circumstances we didn’t hold much faith for a response but we all took turns giving our owl hoots and hisses etc etc. Nothing... ah well we tried. After walking about 50 paces back to the car, a brazen voice broke through the maelstrom: “WHO COOKS FOR YOU!” The greatest miracle in my owling career. Soon the male was joined by his lady and we were treated to a full range of vocalizations as we left the park... what a way to break the record.

With 30 minutes to spare we zipped down to the White Rock peer to try and spotlight a mew gull or a white-winged scoter- just 2 of the many big misses for the day. When we got there however, the sea was black and very rough and no gull in their right mind would be loafing on the grass that night. I guess we’ll have to settle for 197—a one species “smashing” of the old record set in 1995 by my Dad, Blake Maybank, Tom Plath, and Alvaro Jaramillo.

Full list:

Brant
Canada Goose
Mute Swan
Tundra Swan
Wood Duck
Gadwall
American Wigeon
Mallard
Blue-winged Teal
Cinnamon Teal
Northern Shoveler
Northern Pintail
Green-winged Teal
Canvasback
Redhead
Ring-necked Duck
Greater Scaup
Lesser Scaup
Harlequin Duck
Surf Scoter
Long-tailed Duck
Bufflehead
Common Goldeneye
Barrow’s Goldeneye
Hooded Merganser
Common Merganser
Ruddy Duck
California Quail
Ring-necked Pheasant
Chukar
Ruffed Grouse
Spruce Grouse
Common Loon
Pied-billed Grebe
Horned Grebe
Red-necked Grebe
Western Grebe
American White Pelican
Brandt’s Cormorant
Double-crested Cormorant
Pelagic Cormorant
Great Blue Heron
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
Bald Eagle
Northern Harrier
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Cooper’s Hawk
Red-tailed Hawk
Golden Eagle
American Kestrel
Merlin
Peregrine Falcon
Virginia Rail
Sora
American Coot
Black-bellied Plover
Semipalmated Plover
Killdeer
Black Oystercatcher
American Avocet
Spotted Sandpiper
Solitary Sandpiper
Lesser Yellowlegs
Whimbrel
Long-billed Curlew
Marbled Godwit
Western Sandpiper
Least Sandpiper
Short-billed Dowitcher
Wilson’s Snipe
Wilson’s Phalarope
Bonaparte’s Gull
Ring-billed Gull
California Gull
Glaucous-winged Gull
Caspian Tern
Common Tern
Rock Pigeon
Band-tailed Pigeon
Eurasian Collared-Dove
Mourning Dove
Barn Owl
Flammulated Owl
Western Screech Owl
Great Horned Owl
Northern Pygmy-Owl
Barred Owl
Northern Saw-whet Owl
Common Poorwill
Vaux’s Swift
White-throated Swift
Black-chinned Hummingbird
Anna’s Hummingbird
Calliope Hummingbird
Rufous Hummingbird
Belted Kingfisher
Lewis’s Woodpecker
Williamson’s Sapsucker
Red-naped Sapsucker
Red-breasted Sapsucker
Downy Woodpecker
Hairy Woodpecker
American Three-toed Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Pileated Woodpecker
Western Wood-Pewee
Hammond's Flycatcher
Gray Flycatcher
Dusky Flycatcher
Pacific-slope Flycatcher
Say's Phoebe
Western Kingbird
Eastern Kingbird
Cassin's Vireo
Warbling Vireo
Gray Jay
Steller’s Jay
Clark’s Nutcracker
Black-billed Magpie
American Crow
Northwestern Crow
Common Raven
Purple Martin
Tree Swallow
Violet-green Swallow
Northern Rough-winged Swallow
Bank Swallow
Cliff Swallow
Barn Swallow
Black-capped Chickadee
Mountain Chickadee
Chestnut-backed Chickadee
Boreal Chickadee
Bushtit
White-breasted Nuthatch
Red-breasted Nuthatch
Pygmy Nuthatch
Brown Creeper
Rock Wren
Canyon Wren
Bewick’s Wren
House Wren
Winter Wren
Marsh Wren
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Western Bluebird
Mountain Bluebird
Townsend’s Solitaire
Veery
Swainson’s Thrush
Hermit Thrush
American Robin
Varied Thrush
European Starling
Cedar Waxwing
Orange-crowned Warbler
Nashville Warbler
Yellow Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Black-throated Gray Warbler
Townsend’s Warbler
Northern Waterthrush
MacGillivray’s Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
Wilson’s Warbler
Yellow-breasted Chat
Spotted Towhee
Chipping Sparrow
Brewer’s Sparrow
Vesper Sparrow
Lark Sparrow
Savannah Sparrow
Song Sparrow
Lincoln’s Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Western Tanager
Black-headed Grosbeak
Lazuli Bunting
Bobolink
Red-winged Blackbird
Western Meadowlark
Yellow-headed Blackbird
Brewer’s Blackbird
Brown-headed Cowbird
Bullock's Oriole
Pine Grosbeak
Purple Finch
Cassin’s Finch
House Finch
Red Crossbill
Pine Siskin
American Goldfinch
Evening Grosbeak
House Sparrow

Judging from some of the big misses like Gray Catbird, Willow Flycatcher, Olive-sided Flycatcher, WW Scoter, Dunlin, RB Merg, Pacific Loon, etc. 200 is definitely possible! Next year!

Update soon!

2010-05-17T22:54:00.000-07:00

Just got back from the coast, will update tomorrow! Pulled off a pelagic out of Sooke sailing towards Bamfield and picked up some nice birds including Brown Pelican, Tufted Puffin, and Cassin's Auklet.

Red-throated Pipit Chase

2010-05-13T11:43:00.000-07:00

May 11:

I awoke sick and woozy this morning, lying on my camping-mat in Ilya Povalyaev's South Surrey home. I suppose waking up at 4:30am to bird all day then driving through the night to the coast is not the best way to nurse a progressing soar throat. BUT THERE WERE MORE IMPORTANT THINGS AT STAKE! We left the house at 5:50am and headed to Ladner where we met Larry Cowan and Kevin Neill who would be our pipit-chasing companions for the day. Larry kindly offered his vehicle for the carpool and we were off to the ferries to catch the 7am sailing... only to find out from the cheery ticket-booth operator that we would in fact be on the "9 o'clock sailing." Disaster! We were already nervous enough about the prospects of coming all this way for a bird that might not be there, and now we had to sit through several more hours in ferry terminal purgatory... praying for a miracle. We passed the time by working on our "terminal lists"-- the usual GLAUCOUS-WINGED GULLS and ROCK PIGEONS floated around the buildings, while SURF SCOTERS and COMMON LOONS floated offshore; a fly-over AMERICAN GOLDFINCH gave us some relative excitement, and this obliging VIOLET-GREEN SWALLOW allowed Ilya to test out the close-focus on his bins:
At some point during the wait, Roger Foxall called to inform us that the pipit was still there. Definitely an encouraging sign but of course this only added to the torture.

Finally we were able to board the ferry and get under way... fingers and toes crossed! Bird-wise the ferry crossing was fairly slow compared to the previous week. The 8,000 or so BONAPARTE'S GULLS were replaced by 3, and our Rhino count was reduced to 2. There were a good number of PACIFIC LOONS passing by, and the highlight of Active Pass was a group of ~50 PIGEON GUILLEMOTS.

Once on land we raced to Island View Rd and were relieved to see three vehicles nearby with some birders nearby in a field with scopes trained on something. But when we approached, local birder Jeremy Gatten informed us that the bird hadn't been seen for several hours and that only 20ish out of the 100 American Pipits were left in the field near the reservoir. OH NO! Was missing the ferry the final dagger! Had I driven all the way down to the coast and ferried across the Strait of Georgia for nothing? (Well perhaps not nothing, I knew I could see some cool things like Purple Martin and Whimbrel perhaps but STILL! you know what I mean) Our hunting group, now totaling 7 1/2 able-bodied birders (I was a bit out of it at this point) continued to scour the field where the pipit HAD been. After about 20 minutes Jeremy suggested we split into several groups to check all the other fields in the area for larger groups of pipits. I ended up with Jeremy and we headed over to Lochside Drive where the bird had originally been discovered by Mike Bentley. Soon after our arrival we did discover a medium-sized group of pipits but try-as-we-might, no birds with red throats. Viewing wasn't necissarily ideal though, the problem with these pipits is that they seem to enjoy feeding in fields with a grass height of exactly 1 pipit-length. AND, if there are any depressions or hills in the landscape, it appears that spending long periods of time completely obscured by these geographical features is quite preferable.

It was a pleasure to re-meet Michael McGrenere who was passing by on his road-bike. Apparently he was with me and others at the Tumbler Ridge BCFO when I saw my lifer MOURNING, CONNECTICUT, CAPE MAY, and CANADA WARBLERS along Brassey Creek. That was indeed a fantastic field-trip led by Mark Phinney back in my high-school days! Anyways, Mike stopped in and helped us search for the pipit for a bit even though he had already seen it. After a while he headed off to check some other fields and we resumed our vigil... still no rare pipit but I got to see and hear my first "North American" SKY LARK flight-songs! Then we noticed Mike M peddling hard back towards us, could he possibly have seen the bird? He pulled up and announced that there was a GOLDEN-PLOVER of some sort in an adjacent field. Not a mega-rarity of course but a nice novelty for all three of us since the majority of golden-plovers pass through the inner coast in fall as juveniles or as adults in basic plumage. We tracked down the bird and checked it out in the scope as it darted from grass tuft- to tuft. No obvious white-flanks so American right? Well apparently not, later on Michael returned got some photographs revealing several very Pacific Golden-Plover characteristics. (You can follow the ID discussion on the VI Birds email group) So a nice humbling experience in hindsight!

Anyways back to the main event: The other pipit-team came by to announce that they had not seen a single pipit in any other fields so they joined us and soon we discovered that there were indeed around 80 pipits nearby... perhaps the red-throat was amongst them? As I mentioned before, scanning the flock was not an easy task. At any one point only 5 or 6 seemed to be visible, then once you got onto something potentially interesting the entire flock would take off and land in another field. On top of this I was starting to feel very light-headed and my nose just wouldn't stop running... but knowing that we needed as many eyes open as possible I tried my best to stay upright (choosing to cope by constantly complaining of course). Then all of a sudden, after hours of staring at weeds through my broken scope, Ilya exclaimed, "I've got it, I've got THE BIRD!" I abandoned my scope in the middle of the road and sprinted over to the rest of the groups where eyes were now being trained on the RED-THROATED PIPIT, eventually we all got good looks at the bird (or so I thought) and it was now time for the celebration shot!

[For this photo I asked everyone to give me their celebration poses-- in my elation and sudden burst of energy, I did not realize that Larry Cowan, the leader of our expedition had not yet seen the pipit! Ironically, he is the only one giving the THUMPS UP. I suppose is scope-case is masking an expression of sarcasm and deep frustration... now that's loyalty to the Big Year Blog!!! But don't worry readers, Larry got a great look at the pipit a few minutes later and finally the rest of the group could celebrate including Ilya who re-spotted it (good thing he didn't do this immediately after finding it!):

With a bit of time to kill before the next ferry, Jeremy G kindly offered to take us to Saanichton Spit where he had seen 3 whimbrels the day before. A quick check of a couple of the good spots finally revealed a single WHIMBREL on the outer side of the spit-- another great year bird!

Too bad the Canucks lost that night...

A HUGE THANK YOU to all the Island folks who stuck around to help us see the pipit even though they already had! I invite you all to come up and visit the Okanagan any time!

May 10 Little Big Day

2010-05-13T10:47:00.000-07:00

This morning David Chapman rolled into the driveway at 4:28am. I was feeling a little under the weather but that's no excuse to avoid doing a big day of birding in the South Okanagan! David had challenged me to design a route that would get us over 100 species and obviously starting early helps! I call this a "Little Big Day" since we didn't start until 4:30 and we ended in the afternoon; a true "Big Day" is midnight to midnight!

So off we went, first to Max Lake to try for poorwill just before dawn. No luck with the goatsucker but we picked up some good birds like DUSKY GROUSE (single-hoots from high on the ridge), both SORA and VIRGINIA RAIL, and many singing SPOTTED TOWHEES and HOUSE WRENS. From there we headed south to OK Falls and up the 201/Shuttleworth Ck Rd where we rain into a gangling pair of MOOSE!

Our first stop was out at KM 25 where snow still covered most of the road! Consequently, not a single Hermit Thrush could be heard in the forest. We did pick up some nice species though: BLACK-BACKED and AMERICAN THREE-TOED WOODPECKER, NORTHERN PYGMY-OWL, VARIED THRUSH, and flyover NORTHERN HARRIER, and a single PINE GROSBEAK. David had never seen a Boreal Chickadee before so we spent a fair amount of time at my "no worries-guaranteed" spots but no luck! Finally somewhere around KM 20 we called in at least 2 of these gorgeous tits (!).

The woodpecker extravaganza continued downhill where PILEATED and HAIRY WOODPECKERS drummed and called loudly from the the larches, and coolest of all-- a pair of WILLIAMSON'S SAPSUCKERS + a pair of RED-NAPED SAPSUCKERS perched briefly in the same tree on the Dutton Creek Rd!

Down the hill we went, and the forest birds continued to produce: all 3 nuthatches, singing CASSIN'S FINCH and WESTERN TANAGERS, WESTERN BLUEBIRD, DUSKY and HAMMOND'S FLYCATCHERS, CASSIN'S VIREO, EVENING GROSBEAK, RED CROSSBILL, and NASHVILLE WARBLER-- to name but a few.

From OK Falls we turned south and headed to Vaseux Lake where YELLOW WARBLERS and MARSH WRENS called along the boardwalk, then we met Laure Neish near the cliffs and she informed us of a couple groups of LEWIS'S WOODPECKERS up the road. We headed up there and sure enough! We now had every possible woodpecker (except White-headed) for the morning list! We also added WHITE-THROATED SWIFT, CANYON WREN, and a brief look at a PEREGRINE FALCON.

Next up was Rd. 22 where we watched a male LONG-BILLED CURLEW dive-bomb an adult BALD EAGLE, then picked up over 10 species of waterfowl at Deadman's Lake plus half a dozen stunning WILSON'S PHALAROPES.

I was planning on driving to Creston today to look for stilts, terns, and turkeys so we headed back to Penticton in the early afternoon where we easily added GREAT HORNED OWL, CALLIOPE HUMMINGBIRD, and RUFOUS HUMMINGBIRD. We ended the day with something like 126 species (later in the evening David added a few from Kelowna bringing his personal total to 130!) so not a bad outing!

After taking a quick nap, I made the rash decision to drive to Vancouver instead of Creston, opting to chase a mega-rare RED-THROATED PIPIT in spring plumage... a big risk as spring pipits aren't known to stick around too long, especially with sunny weather... details on the twitch soon!

Thanks for the great day David!

(photo of a big BLACK BEAR seen in Manning Park during my drive to the coast-- it was around this time that I realized I was getting pretty darn sick and that this might not be a good idea!)

Gray Partridge finally!

2010-05-09T20:13:00.000-07:00

After a few failed attempts to locate Gray Partridge around the Okanagan, today Sam Brett and I were finally successful! (I think the photo just about explains it). Also present nearby were my first WILSON'S PHALAROPES of the year!

Okanagan Birding

2010-05-08T23:05:00.001-07:00

May 7: Today I trying going after Doug Brown's Black-throated Sparrow near Osoyoos. Since it had been seen with a roving band of White-crowned Sparrows I didn't have my hopes up... and rightly so as I missed it of course! I did have a nice day down in the south Okanagan however seeing lots of newly arrived CHIPPING SPARROWS, my first YELLOW WARBLERS of the year singing at Haynes Point, a single WARBLING VIREO (also at Haynes Point), and a WESTERN KINGBIRD (along Black Sage Road). After attempting the BT Sparrow I headed over to Richter Pass for a shot at a Sage Sparrow. Once again I did not fluke out but got some great looks at VESPER SPARROW (pictured-above) and 5 LONG-BILLED CURLEWS.

May 8: I headed up to Vernon this morning to meet up with my friend Aaron Deans and check out his new place... the Bishop Wild Bird Sanctuary! Not a bad place to live! Great finch diversity at the feeders including CASSIN'S and HOUSE FINCH, a couple families of RED CROSSBILLS (juv., and adult male with juv. shown below), 10+ EVENING GROSBEAKS (male featured below), PINE SISKINS, and AMERICAN GOLDFINCH. The main reason for making the visit however was for a North Okanagan Naturalist Club event: Everyone was gathered at the sanctuary to pay tribute to the club's founding member and one of the most esteemed naturalists in British Columbia's brief birding history: James Grant. A Sycamore has been planted in his memory and various group swapped memories about the great man before we all split into groups to "BIO BLITZ" the sanctuary. After 30 minutes and despite it being the afternoon my group had over 30 species of birds and over 50 species of plants! Definitely a nice "yard" Aaron! Below are some photo highlights:

I left Vernon around 3pm and headed straight to Salmon Arm in the hopes of turning up a stilt. No luck on that front (of course!) but there were still tons of birds. Very high duck numbers especially GADWALL, GREEN-WINGED TEAL, and AMERICAN WIGEON (still a few EURASIAN WIGEONS mixed in). A couple AMERICAN WHITE-PELICANS loafed out on a sandbar and it was absolutely fantastic to watch the WESTERN GREBES carry out their impressive courtship display, with all 6 species of swallows overhead, chirping OSPREY, the "pweep-pweep-pweep" of my first SPOTTED SANDPIPER of the year, and the raucous noise coming from the RING-BILLED GULL colony. I suppose the bird highlight for the Bay was a single BLACK-BELLIED PLOVER near the rive outlet-- always a nice bird in spring in the interior.

On the drive back south as dusk set in, I stopped at Otter Lake where picked up a single LONG-BILLED DOWITCHER, 4 GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GEESE, and a SWAINSON'S HAWK (among the other usuals). O'Keefe's Pond was full of ducks as usual, and L&A Crossroads turned up a flock of 20 LEAST SANDPIPERS (lots of them around). I made it to Robert Lake just before it got too dark to see but unfortunately still no stilts!

Time for bed, HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!!
(Here's a photo of some expecting parents-- nice comparison of sexes)

Sponsor my NMT Big Day

2010-05-06T16:43:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone!

Thank you so much for tuning into my humble blog and checking out all the birding activities I've been carrying out. Things are really starting to pick up now that spring is here and it's hard to find the time to stay inside and update this thing. Anyways, I thought I would put the word out that I will once again be going for an NMT "Big Day" on May 23rd in the Okanagan. I will be joined by 3 or 4 other cyclists and we will try and see 120+ species in one day using bikes. As part of this fun Meadowlark Festival event known as the "Okanagan Big Day Challenge" I hope to raise some money for the Baillie Fund and more importantly-- for the Vaseux Lake Bird Observatory. I would really appreciate the support, so if you have a few spare dollars floating around please sponsor me and my crazy amigos! You can either donate a flat rate (i.e $5, $10, $20, $10,000.. etc!) or by the species-- for instance if I see 100 species in 24 hours and you pledged 20 cents per species, that would be $20. Follow this link to pledge:

http://www.bsc-eoc.org/support/birdathon/index.jsp?targetpg=donate&=EN&number=36054

or, if you know that you will see me before May 23rd, you can certainly hand me the donations directly.

Have a great spring and thanks for helping out! NTM ALL THE WAAAY!

Russ Cannings
Penticton, BC

Cancelled pelagics can't keep me from birding the coast!

2010-05-06T11:26:00.000-07:00

After hearing that both of our Juan de Fuca pelagics (May 1 and 2) were cancelled due to high seas, Avery Bartels (who had just driven to the Okanagan from Nelson), Tanya Seebacher, and I decided to make the best of it by going over there anyways. Perhaps high winds out of the west would drive some things into shore?

Avery and I birded around the Kelowna area on Friday morning enjoying a great variety of new arrivals to the Okanagan including my first DUSKY FLYCATCHER of the year that gave us his soft "wit" call in Sutherland Hills Park. Several passes of Robert Lake and the dump didn't turn up anything out of the ordinary but it was nice to see that several avocets are starting to look "nesty." After lunch we met up with Tanya and headed straight to the coast where we spent the night in South Surrey with Ilya Povalyaev.

The next morning the 4 of us started off at Brunswick Point in hopes of tracking down the reported Ross's Goose. We did see a large flock of SNOW GEESE and 1 GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GOOSE but no tiny white birds. Just as we walked up onto the dyke however we were treated to a fantastic display of WESTERN SANDPIPERS (a lifer for Tanya)!!! Several thousand lined the rocks along the dyke at high tide and allowed for a very close approach. Every once in a while the flock would take off and swirl this way and that, revealing a number of DUNLIN amongst their ranks (see photo).

I added a few other new birds to the year list here as well including: COMMON YELLOWTHROAT, WILSON'S WARBLER, and CASPIAN TERN. It was also nice to see a MARBLED GODWIT pass overhead calling away.

Next stop was the Beach Grove area where we met up with my dad who was in town for the big BC BREEDING BIRD ATLAS party. Lots of warblers moving through the woods including at least one BLACK-THROATED GRAY WARBLER (heard but not seen). Out on the shoreline at the foot of 12th some of the northern atlasers including Mark Phinney and Sandra Kinsey joined us for some shorebird scoping. Loads of DUNLIN and WESTERN SANDS out there of course, plus a few new BC birds for me: SEMIPALMATED PLOVER and LEAST SANDPIPER. The 4 of us mid our farewells then headed to 72nd street where we birded the old subdivision near the airport with Nathan Hentze. Wind was a factor but there was still a nice selection of warblers including a single male TOWNSEND'S. A quick afternoon stop at Crescent Park provided me with my first PACIFIC-SLOPE FLYCATCHER of the year... funny how the first Okanagan birds don't return until late May?

A mad dash to the ferries got us onto the 3pm sailing with 8 minutes to spare! The ride across was fairly productive especially around Active Pass where thousands of BONAPARTE'S GULLS fed in the tidal rip. Many PIGEON GUILLEMOTS and RHINO AUKLETS were also present and the highlight of the trip was an adult JAEGER of some sort that was spotted by Avery as it flew away. Unfortunately we couldn't confidently assign it to species but it was likely a Parasitic based on what we saw (plus they are the most likely jaeger to be seen from the ferry).

When we arrived on land we stopped in at the bulb fields on Central Saanich Road where we quickly got onto an inconspicuous SKY LARK (pictured).

MAY 2: We spent the day in the Victoria area fighting wind and rain but still finding a few neat things. At Clover Point a playful RIVER OTTER (pictured) put in appearance as well as a very large STELLER'S SEA-LION. Next up was Esquimalt Lagoon where the weather was really starting to get unpleasant and I had not dressed appropriately. The main highlight there were 2 flocks of GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GEESE totaling over 300 birds!--a novelty for an Okanaganite. (These geese would put on another great show the next day) Our last stop of the day was at the very scenic Witty's Lagoon where a great mixture of seabirds, shorebirds, and forests birds, all mingled amongst a backdrop of towering fir and arbutus.

May 3: PORT RENFREW!

Today 3 of us (Ilya had left for a job in Whistler) headed out early towards Port Renfrew hoping that the high winds might turn up a winged-treasure of some sort. We checked out the Sheringham Point lighthouse west of Sooke where about 30 SOOTY SHEARWATERS passed by well offshore. A single MARBLED MURRELET floated nearby and 2 ANCIENT MURRELETS whizzed by in quick succession. We left just before the rain really got going and headed straight to Botanical Beach near Port Renfrew. There we met Louie ______(?) who was out there scoping the towering waves. Unfortunately there seemed to be very little in terms of birdlife on the sea itself but overhead a real spectacle was taking place: hundreds of GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GEESE (I'm sure it would have been thousands if we had spent the entire day) were pouring over the Strait of Juan de Fuca, struggling against the wind but always pushing north. In amongst the ~1000 white-fronts were a few CACKLING GEESE and oddly enough, single male NORTHERN SHOVELERS accompanied the geese in 2 flocks... a little desperate for company I guess but still keeping the V formation (pictured)!

While taking a break from scoping I noticed a mid-sized shorebird land on a rock in front of us-- a casual glance through the bins... "WANDERING TATTLER!!!" It took off right away (either because I yelled or because the winds were blowing at 100km/hour) then a second one joined it! They both flew over to another wave platform nearby where we all got it in the scope. Although this is a regular spring and fall migrant along the outer coast of BC, I was relieved to see one as they're passage is often in a few small window and they never stick around too long.

We checked a few more PR spots with Louie (who has birded this area quite a bit), turning up a few bits and bobs including my first LONG-BILLED DOWITCHERS of the year, a single MINK (pictured), and 7 ROOSEVELT ELK!!! I seem to be racking up a good mammal list this year too!

After a great day out on the wild coast we set out on our long journey back to the Okanagan-- the only setbacks being a 4-2 canucks loss to Chicago, still no whimbrels or martins at Blackie Spit, and a massive snowfall between Hope and Merrit which eventually resulted in a 3am return home.

Looking forward to the next big trip!

Shorebirding just starting to get going in the Okanagan

2010-05-05T17:00:00.000-07:00

Usually I start to see the first Solitary Sandpipers, Least Sandpipers, and Wilson's Phalaropes in late April. This year however has been late! Solitaries arrived around the beginning of May, Leasts arrived 2 days ago, and I still haven't seen nor heard of a phalarope yet! American Avocets have put on a good show however with 23 birds at Robert Lake and 6 more at Alki Lake. So far I haven't been able to catch up with any Black-becked Stilts but hopefully some will show up soon! Here are some photos of a pair of AMERICAN AVOCETS at the Kelowna dump (aka Alki Lake), a nice GREATER VS. LESSER YELLOWLEGS comparison, and Avery Bartels scoping the Bonaparte's Gulls at L&A Crossroads near Vernon where I picked up my first WESTERN SANDPIPER.

ROSS'S GEESE = YES!

2010-04-28T16:06:00.000-07:00

After hearing about the appearance of a small group of Ross's Geese in Vanderhoof (1.5 hours west of Prince George), the wheels in my head started turning. Although these rare geese sometimes turn up in the southern interior or on the coast, you just never know. Would I regret it if I didn't go for it? The word "Yes" came immediately to mind, so... I contacted some PG birders and basically said if the birds are seen again, I'm coming! They were re-found on Saturday, plus Phil Ranson had just informed me that the Harris's Sparrow I had missed in February was once again frequenting a feeder in Williams Lake. With nothing important pressing down south I decided to go for it.

I left Penticton at 5am Monday, and arrived in Williams Lake around 10:30am. I met up with Phil at the Harris's Sparrow spot, but try as we might, we could not find it! There were loads of White-crowns, Purple Finches, goldfinches, siksins, and a Downy Woodpecker, but alas no Harris! "Oh well, I guess I'll try on the way down." Besides, I knew I had a shot in the fall. "Time to get up north for the main target!"

Around 2pm I rolled into the Superstore parking lot in Prince George where a group of the city's finest birders awaited-- Sandra Kinsey, Laird Law, Nancy Krueger, and Carolyn McGhee. We all loaded into one vehicle and headed to Vanderhoof, where after a quick pit-stop near the Nechako River we arrived at "the pond." After a few nail-biting seconds we rounded the corner, revealing a group of 20+ white geese out on the water-- the SNOW GEESE that the Ross's Geese had been consorting with... hopefully they were still in there! We got the scopes out and sure enough, there were 5 smaller white-headed geese... ROSS'S GEESE. After a huge sigh of relief, I pumped my fists and let out a loud "YESSSS!!!" Here is a photo of the Ross's Goose crew:

And here are the geese (note the small size, smaller bill and pure white heads in comparison to the big snowies)

After about 5 minutes of watching the geese a large truck drove by and all the geese took off and flew away! Where did they go? I have no idea but I consider myself VERY lucky to have caught up with them!!! There were many other duck species in the area as well as some newly-arrived swallows including my BC year firsts: CLIFF SWALLOW and NORTHERN ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOW. We cruised around some farm roads nearby and found a small flock of AMERICAN PIPITS (new for the year believe it or not) as well as many LONG-BILLED CURLEWS including a group of at least 12. Perhaps there were more but as you can see, they blend in quite well!

We finished off the day by checking Nulki and Tachick Lakes (of Ross's GULL fame), as well as a few marshes. Highlights: My first PG checklist area REDHEADS, several YELLOW-HEADED BLACKBIRDS, and BLUE-WINGED TEAL (the first time I've ever seen this species before Cinnamon Teal in a year). On the big lakes there were hundreds of GREATER SCAUP, RING-NECKED DUCKS, BUFFLEHEAD, and other divers, while the trees and bushes were filled with WHITE-CROWNED SPARROWS and YELLOW-RUMPED WARBLERS. Up in the sky we had a few raptors: BALD EAGLES, OSPREYS, RED-TAILED HAWKS, AMERICAN KESTRELS, and always a treat: both ROUGH-LEGGED and SWAINSON'S HAWKS on the same day!!! A fantastic outing-- Thank you Sandra, Laird, Nancy, and Carolyn!!! I'm sure I'll be back soon.

Lists updated

2010-04-25T22:02:00.000-07:00

I have updated the list on the blog (see the tab near the top left), and have also updated the lists on the various chat groups around the province. For the time being, I have included American Black Duck because I've copied the list off eBird-- I recognize the fact that many birders don't consider the VI population legit so more on that later I guess. Also note that the lists on the bird groups are in taxonomic order but on the blog they are in chronological order.

It's been great to get back to BC birding after a great trip to Texas. Some recent yearbirds from the Okanagan include AMERICAN AVOCET (pictured) in Kelowna (22 of them!) and CALLIOPE HUMMINGBIRD.

Tomorrow I'm heading north again hoping to catch up with Harris's Sparrow and Ross's Goose among other things... should be fun!

Russ

TEXAS

2010-04-22T16:57:00.000-07:00

So it sounds like a missed a couple nice birds while away... King Eider, Sage Sparrow, Parakeet Auklet... oh well I guess I'll have to settle with the 50 or 60 lifers (still haven't counted) I got in Texas. Yes it was an awesome trip. Here's the brief story and a few photos to browse:----->

Well Dad and I have just returned from a great trip to Texas. We had 12 days to bird and covered a lot of ground between Houston the Rio Grande and the eastern portion of the Edwards Plateau. We ended up with 305 species so obviously there were a lot of grins and high-fives but a few birds were missed as usual, either by bad luck, torrential rain, or because early/mid-April is too early for several breeders. Here’s a summary for those interested:

We started bright and early in the Piney Woods north of Houston on April 8th where we easily picked up the specialties we had hoped for, namely: RED-COCKADED WOODPECKER, BROWN-HEADED NUTHATCH, CAROLINA CHICKADEE, and PINE WARBLER. After a few hours in that area we drove all the way down to Harlingen (near the Mexico border) because we wanted to get out raptor-banding with Bill Clark (pictured) before he headed to Alaska to work on Harly Hawks. In addition to getting point blank views of HARRIS’S HAWKS (in the hand) Bill also took us to some great local spots where many other Rio Grande specialties came into view; stuff like APLOMADO FALCON (3 different unbanded birds seen in the Brownsville area), FULVOUS WHISTLING DUCK, CASSIN’S SPARROW, GREEN JAY, WHITE-TAILED HAWK, and ALTAMIRA ORIOLE. SCISSOR-TAILED FLYCATCHERS (pictured at top), COUCH'S and TROPICAL KINGBIRDS, EASTERN MEADOWLARKS, and LARK SPARROWS were all over the roadsides, and Bill even casually pointed out 2 RINGED KINGFISHERS perched on a wire in the middle of suburban Harlingen! That evening we checked an RV Park where Green Parakeets supposedly roosted. No luck with them but instead we were rewarded with 4 RED-CROWNED PARROTS including a pair checking out a potential nest hole in a tall palm (we did later see GREEN PARAKEETS on the side of the highway one morning while driving through Harlingen).

The next day was spent at Santa Ana State Park (a beautiful forest reserve along the Rio Grande) where highlights included several CLAY-COLORED THRUSHES, a GREEN KINGFISHER, many MISSISSIPPI KITES, 2 GRAY HAWKS, hundreds of BROAD-WINGED and SWAINSON’S HAWKS (all on their northward migration), NORTHERN BEARDLESS-TYRANNULETS, an EASTERN SCREECH-OWL, and my lifer SEDGE WREN and SUMMER TANAGER (yeah I had lots of lifers on this trip).(GREEN JAY)

We were getting a little worried about missing Whooping Crane (most leave the Texas wintering grounds by early April) so we dashed back up to Corpus Christi (central coast) where we boarded “The Skimmer” in Fulton—we headed out into the middle of the Aransas Refuge where 8 WHOOPING CRANES (a cohort of young birds) awaited our bins and cameras!!! YESSSS!!! Other lifers for me from the boat were REDDISH EGRET, and PROTHONOTARY WARBLER and SCARLET TANAGER which we spotted in a bush on a small island in the middle of nowhere!

From Aransas we headed back down to the Rio Grande (yeah our itinerary was a little wonky) where things are a little blurry--- all I remember is that there was a lot of driving and very heavy rain involved as we birded the Rio Grande Valley for a few days. Some of the highlights that stick out in my mind: Seeing several SWALLOW-TAILED KITES and an ELF OWL (pictured below) at Bentsen State Park, 2 MUSCOVY DUCKS (Roma Bluffs), a RED-BILLED PIGEON (Salineno), and COMMON PAURAQUE. We also twitched a reported Black-vented Oriole on South Padre Island at some point. Like everyone else we missed it but there was a mini-fallout on the island at the same time so we picked up a good number of migrants including BLUE-WINGED WARBLER, KENTUCKY WARBLER, PAINTED BUNTING, BLUE GROSBEAK, and much more.

Because of all the rain we couldn’t visit the Brownville Dump where “THE crow” had been seen recently—the extreme wetness also hindered our attempts to locate Brown Jay and seedeaters but I wasn’t complaining…. well I was, but really…. We were still having a wicked-cool time!

Next up was the Edward’s Plateau (aka the Hill Country) where GOLDEN-CHEEKED WARBLER (pictured below) and BLACK-CAPPED VIREO were both surprisingly easy to locate (despite continued rain). We added many more birds to the trip list here, western stuff like HUTTON’S VIREO, CANYON TOWHEE, BLACK PHOEBE, WESTERN SCRUB-JAY, and VARIED BUNTING.

With only a few days left on the trip we made another looong commute back towards Houston and further west. First we twitched a very late Canada Goose (for the trip list of course) but failed to locate it… darn eh? But at the CAGO spot we did pick up BELL’S VIREO, a couple singing YELLOW-BREASTED CHATS, and thousands of BRAZILIAN FREE-TAILED BATS--- still swirling around at 8am! So, that day we drove all the way to the famed High Island where… of course… they experienced the “slowest day of the season.”

No time to worry, we opted to hit Anahuac (a vast swamp/grassy reserve) the next morning and boy did it pay off!!! There is a large expanse known as “Yellow Rail Prairie” where on Saturdays people can join a tour where 10+ people line up and drag ropes and cans across the marsh and sometimes flush up rails. Well it was a Sunday so Dad and I thought we may as well try ourselves. Within 5 minutes we flushed a YELLOW RAIL—no rope cans or bottles dragging required! The best was yet to come as we could hear 2 or 3 BLACK RAILS calling constantly. We headed in their direction and all of a sudden realized that one was only 5 meters away concealed underneath the grass. We stayed with that bird for about 10 minutes, parting grass, walking around, even playing a tape… every once in a while it would call or we would see some grass move but it never showed itself. One moment it would be 2 meters away to out right then 15 second later it was 5 meters to the left. This thing probably walked through our legs and we never saw it! Still a fantastic experience as this is probably the hardest breeding bird in North America to see (well… Gray-headed Chickadee can be tough if you don’t have a lot of time on your hands). Anyways, later on in the morning we got great looks at KING (pictured) and CLAPPER RAILS, SORA, and 2 LEAST BITTERNS. Lots of great birds that day in the wetlands, then later at “The Willows” near the park’s headquarters and at High Island thanks to some scattered showers which pushed new migrants in. Both species of waterthrush, WOOD THRUSH, AMERICAN REDSTART, BLACKPOLL WARBLER, and PURPLE GALLINULE were all tallied among other things.

April 19th (our second last day) was spent birding the migrant traps at High Island and Sabine Woods. More lifers came for me including BLACKBURNIAN and CERULEAN WARBLERS, and some other great ABA birds like FISH CROW and MAGNIFICENT FRIGATEBIRD (2 females flying over the beach near High Island).

Our last day was for The Big Thicket (NE of Houston) birds. That’s “East Texas” where pine, oak, and various broadleaves dominate the landscape. Just before dawn we heard CHUCK-WILL’S-WIDOWS calling away, and soon after I welcomed 2 more new birds: PRAIRIE and SWAINSON’S WARBLER. After hearing a couple at a great distance, it was great to finally get good views of a BACHMAN’S SPARROW up near Jasper. We looped back to Houston the long way through Louisiana (just for kicks) and finished off the trip at the Best Western in Houston where Chris Charlesworth’s tour patrons were still stranded.

50+ lifers for me and 11 for Pops. A fun time to be sure… but time to get back to BC birds!

Russell Cannings
Back in the OK

Looking back and looking forward

2010-04-06T21:26:00.001-07:00

It's been over 3 months now since I set off on this "quest" to find as many birds in BC as I possibly can. Well, "possibly can within reason" is more like it as I will surely be working here and there, socializing with friends and family, and... I'm going to TEXAS TOMORROW MORNING!!! Yes I'm off to Texas for 2 weeks with my Dad for a bit of spring birding, should be awesome as I have never been down there-- it will be nice to work on my Blackburnian chip notes for when I go up to the Peace! Anyways, the last 3 months have been great; I've made many new friends and reacquainted myself with a few old ones, I've discovered some great new places, and there have obviously been some incredible experiences along the way (both with birds and with the rest of the world). Over this time period I managed to see about 85% of the birds reported in BC. Many of the ones I missed I will pick up in good time but some may be tough.

There are 3 species in particular that I had hoped to have by now but don't:

1. SLATY-BACKED GULL- several were reported both on the mainland and on the island. I searched very hard for this species in February but unfortunately did not get over to the Herring Spawn until after things had died down. Apparently this years' spawn has not been a good one. This could have been a factor but I probably could have picked one out had I put in the time. All is not lost of course, I can still get this bird in Nov/Dec if I keep scanning those darn gulls on Boundary Bay or somethin!

2. HARRIS'S SPARROW- The only report of this species that I know of for 2010 is one that frequented a feeder in Williams Lake in early January. I visited that very feeder about a week after it was last seen with no luck. So why were there no Harris's Sparrows being seen in the interior this winter? I think the principle cause for this was the above-average temperatures. There were plenty of feeding opportunities in the forests and in the fields for sparrows this year so few had to huddle around feeders. Hopefully I'll pick this species up on spring migration with the white-crowns and failing that perhaps in December.

3. HOARY REDPOLL- The only chance I had for this species down south was in the mountains around the Okanagan in January where several individuals were reported with Common Redpolls on Christmas Bird Counts. I tried and tried but couldn't find the massive redpoll flocks and thus struck out. Hoaries were present in decent numbers in the northwest including Telegraph Creek and Houston, BC but frankly I just couldn't find the time to get up there. I suppose a November trip to Fort Nelson is in order!

SO... I'm off on holiday for a bit, time to enjoy some new birds! I'm sure many of you will find some great things while I'm gone--please convince them to stay until I return!!! May is going to be crazy and I can't wait! 300 ain't that far off...

Also, I will make sure to post a full list on both my blog and on the birding chat groups; Right now I need to get to some last-minute packing so when I get into Houston, TX tomorrow I'll get to the lists.

Cheers--- to spring!

Russ Cannings

p.s. Just saw my first Yellow-headed Blackbird today!

Easter Birding in the Okanagan: RAIN+WIND+SNOW

2010-04-03T17:24:00.000-07:00

The weather hasn't been great of late (although apparently a lot nicer than on the coast!) but there have been some nice birds around. On Friday I headed to White Lake hoping to scare up some partridge or perhaps a singing Sage Sparrow. What I found instead was a light blizzard (and poor visibility), but with the bad there was some good! The bad weather had created a thrush fallout! Over 140 MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRDS on my little walk (probably 500+ in the whole area) and over 100 AMERICAN ROBINS (and loads more around Willowbrook). I have included one of bluebird photos (the one where you can actually see a bird!-- also note the horizontal nature of the precipitation).

Today (Saturday), Sam Brett and I cruised around to a few spots in the South Okanagan including McKinney, Rd. 22, and Vaseux Lake. More wind and rain today but some birds showed themselves well including my first OSPREY of the year at Rd. 22, a LONG-BILLED CURLEW (also at Rd. 22), my first winter-female RUSTY BLACKBIRD for the Okanagan (Vaseux-- yes it's a bad shot but you can tell what it is--note the pale eye), a couple WHITE-THROATED SWIFTS (Vaseux--year bird), and a TURKEY VULTURE eating a dog on the Penticton Indian Reserve... yummy.

Next BC Bird: Tricolored Blackbird as selected by You!

2010-03-31T09:49:00.000-07:00

Thanks for participating in this fun exercise! Some great comments and opinions out there, but I bet BC's next first will be something we didn't think about eh? If you have any interesting poll ideas for the blog please send me emails or comments-- I will read them all!

Take care and good birding,

Russ C

Photo highlights from my wet coastal trip

2010-03-30T21:00:00.000-07:00

On Sunday I left Kelowna at 4am to catch the 10:30am ferry out of Horseshoe Bay. I met Mike Ashbee in Nanaimo and we birded until dark between Yellow Point and Deep Bay. Our main target was Slaty-backed Gull but unfortunately we missed it. Still a great day though and I added RUFOUS HUMMINGBIRD and AMERICAN BLACK DUCK (whether or not it counts) to the year list. Also loads and loads of seaducks and gulls along the coast. Truly a spectacle to behold (even though these numbers are down from past years and it's the tail end of the herring spawn).

I grabbed the 9pm ferry back to the mainland then birded the Vancouver area on Monday finding my first WILSON'S SNIPE of the year at the Iona Sewage Lagoons, my first Vancouver area AMERICAN TREE-SPARROWS (also at Iona), my first Vancouver REDHEAD (Reifel), gorgeous looks at an AMERICAN BITTERN (Reifel), and my first ORANGE-CROWNED WARBLER of the year (Queen Elizabeth Park).

Photos (in order):

-2 young Great Blue Herons (Iona)
-American Black Duck pair (Yellow Point)
-mixed scoter and scaup flock (Deep Bay)
-ME and my great new sweater (Thanks Natalie, Kelsey, Colin, and Kevin!!!)
-Gadwall pair (Iona)
-American Bittern (Reifel)
-Fox Sparrow (Reifel)
-Rufous Hummingbird (Reifel)

Bird #200 = Turkey Vulture in Kelowna!

2010-03-26T19:21:00.001-07:00

Fun with Owls

2010-03-26T08:08:00.001-07:00

On the 22nd I went up Gillies Creek to survey for screech-owls close to a large power-line upgrade project (near Skaha Bluffs). In addition to the pair of WESTERN SCREECH-OWLS who responded right away at my third stop I also had a male NORTHERN SAW-WHET OWL that called constantly the entire time I was in the area, and coolest of all was a pair (I think) of LONG-EARED OWLS. From the sound of it, the male who give a series of deep hoots and then the female responded immediately with a loud horse "quack!"

The next night I returned to the same site to try and determine whether or not the screeches were nesting yet, so arrived just before dusk. The female responded immediately to my calls and was clearly not in a nest tree so I made my way over to the other side of the ravine to try and get a look-see. As darkness fell both owls started to call back and forth apparently hidden in a clump of mistletoe in a Douglas Fir. Then through the black (with the help of a quarter moon) I caught a glimpse of some movement low over the ground just 15 feet from my hiding place. I turned on the flashlight and WOW there was the female perched on a small stick projecting from the ground only 15 feet away. She glanced casually in my direction then continued to survey the habitat-- perhaps looking for the male I thought. A few minutes later I switched on the light again to see if she was still there-- not only that, but the male was now sitting 5 feet from my head on a low branch! Then he flew past my head and landed on a stump right behind me, and the pair began to call back and forth continuously with me silently grinning in the middle! After 5 or 10 minutes of that the male flew off towards the creek and started to hunt actively while the female changed perches (just behind me up the bank) and started giving constant twittering begging calls.

I have been lucky enough to see many Western Screech-Owls in my life but never before have I had the pleasure of watching a pair hunt and interact so freely for such a long period of time-- what an experience! I look forward to returning in April to confirm breeding. Other wildlife present included a pair of GREAT HORNED OWLS, several LITTLE BROWN BATS, and 3 NORTHERN FLYING-SQUIRRELS that gave me great visuals as they dashed from tree to tree giving high-pitched squeaks.

Then two nights ago my Dad and I did his usual owl survey along the KVR and Chute Lake Road above Naramata. It was the route's best run as we chalked up 3 saw-whets and 3 Great Horns, then on the way home we checked a few of his owl boxes and found one with 7 eggs in it--- "must be a saw-whet!" he said. Well I returned last night and sure enough (SEE PHOTO), he was right!

Spotted Owl update

2010-03-25T09:32:00.000-07:00

Check out this Vancouver Sun article detailing the Spotted Owl recovery plan for the future. Although it seems necessary at this point, it is a real shame it has come down to this.

http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Biologists+hope+spotted+owls+help+save+species/2724171/story.html

WHITE-HEADED WOODPECKER = SUCCESS!!!

2010-03-24T19:53:00.000-07:00

From my post to BCINTBIRD:

There have been spotty feeder reports of single White-headed Woodpeckers dating back to last August and continuing through this winter, so since January I've made a point of making visits to the pine woods in the Camp McKinney area. On the 17th however, I received a reliable report of a pair in the forest around Porcupine Place and another possible bird on the Shrike Hill Road. Since then I have gone up there three times but only for a few hours at a time. Today my plan was to spend a full day but as it turns out I didn't need it!

I parked at the very end of Porcupine Road--- where an obvious gas-line cut runs off to the NW. I entered onto the crown land at the gate and headed up the hill (heading NE) for a while stopping to listen for tapping and any other sort of clue. In the distance flickers called and drummed constantly, and large groups of all three species of nuthatches, Cassin's Finches, Mountain Chickadees, Red Crossbills, and Clark's Nutcrackers all came in to investigate my pygmy-owl imitation but no prized white-heads. Having sufficiently covered the area where the pair had been seen I decided to head back down the hill to my car, then search the woods up near the McCuddy Ranch on Old Camp McKinney Road.

But as I approached the car I heard a soft drum... "could this be one?" I thought.... but then a flicker called and flew off the tree in question. "Darn" But then I heard tapping... "maybe this?" but then I discovered that it was a Hairy Woodpecker. I was about to cross the fence when my eye caught a flash of white.... THERE IT IS!!! A male WHITE-HEADED WOODPECKER working a stump only a few meters from where I parked the car!!! I fired off a couple record shots, then proceeded to study the bird and confirm it's sex... certainly a male. After a few minutes he moved up to a nearby tree and continued to fleck bark and work the deadwood much like a Hairy. I called my Dad, and John and Mary Theberge (birders living just down the road) to exclaim my find. Just before the Theberges arrived the bird flew about 80 meters deeper into the woods but I managed to track it down and got them onto it. I took a few more photos and got some video clips which I will post on the blog this evening (after my Dad's book launch which I should get to right away!).

Some interesting observations of the bird:

-Mostly worked pine-beetle-killed trees (who says they only eat pine seeds?)
-Fed with a small party of Hairy Woodpecker
-On one occasion the WH showed a bit of dominance over the Hairy, chasing from a good-looking tree then continuing to feed
-Allowed me to approach fairly close but was clearly aware of my presence and at times looked a little nervous

Eventually after about 25 minutes of observation, he started calling continually and flew up to the top of a snag for about a minute before flying way up the hill. I tried running up and refinding it but no luck. About 30 minutes late Don Wilson and Nancy Krueger arrived but we couldn't relocate the bird (although the wind made things difficult).

YOUTUBE VIDEO LINKS (I am the mysterious Rusty Rizzer BTW):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeuOIjv0zXE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsjRvh05wXA

SPOTTED OWL VIDEO

2010-03-22T09:49:00.000-07:00

Sometimes the link in the top right doesn't work, so if this is happening here is the URL:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9H1gwaOtg_M

Enjoy

March 21: LOGGERHEAD SHRIKE (and falcons)

2010-03-21T22:37:00.000-07:00

After catching a ride down to the coast with Jared and Mary-Ann, I met up with my Dad in West Van where we stayed with family friends. With a mixture of anxious pleasure and mild horror, I opened my email to find that Chris Charlesworth and Ryan Tomlinson had found a Loggerhead Shrike in the Okanagan-- why only when I am not there!!! So this morning (March 21rst) Dad and I left West Van at 7am and drove straight to White Lake where the bird had been seen the day before (it's practically on the way home anyways), but despite some concerted scanning we could not find any shrikes that were not of the "northern" variety. Tired and hungry we started to head to Penticton; my Dad had a funeral to attend so I figured after some grub and a shower I would head back out and explore the site some more. But as we exited the area via the Green Lake Road and started heading north out of OK Falls I got a call from Chris informing us that he was watching the bird right then! "Turn! Turn! Turn!"-- by chance we were just coming up to the north end of White Lake Road. So we headed back down the road and found Chris and Tanya Seebacher scanning the field where it had "JUST BEEN."

Of course of course... but, with the help of Tanya's eagle-eyes the bird was re-found foraging along a fence-line at the north end of the field. "YEEESSSSSS!!!!" I screamed. High-5s all around as this species has eluded me many times over the last 5 years, and what a time to get it! Chris and Tanya offered to take me along for the day so I gave another high-5 to Dad and hopped into the other vehicle. Instead of rest today would be another full birding day! We started off by walking across the field to get closer to the bird. We managed to get within 25 or so meters until we managed to lose it some how... he's a sneaky little thing! Out there we ran into a flock of 9 HORNED LARKS! Year birds for Chris and a lifer for Tanya!

From there we retraced by Dad's and my steps along the Green Lake Road; while stopping at the OK Falls drop-structure to tick off dipper and Barrow's Goldeneye for the day, Chris spotted a large falcon flying south against the cliffs-- "PRAIRIE FALCON!!!" I shouted. Another fantastic bird and another lifer for Tanya. I also added a couple year-birds in the area: VIOLET-GREEN and TREE SWALLOW.

We spent the rest of the day birding the south Okanagan-- a beautiful day that began with the shrike and ended at sunset near Rd. 22 where we spotted 3 more falcons flying over "The Throne" .... 2 PEREGRINES and 1 PRAIRIE... wow!!!

Ok, definitely time for bed now. Searching for White-headed Woodpeckers tomorrow!

March 17-20: Spotted Owls!

2010-03-21T21:17:00.000-07:00

March 17: This morning Dad and I started out early for Lillooet, BC. He had to get to Vancouver to attend some meetings and give some talks on birds and I had to go looking for birds in the Stein Valley... not just birds but SPOTTED OWLS. Dad kindly offered to take a "scenic route" to the coast by cruising over to Spences Bridge, then down the Thompson River to Lytton where we turned north up the Fraser to Lillooet where I was to meet up with Jared Hobbs and Joel Gillis-- 2 of Canada's most knowledgeable Spotted Owl biologists. On the way of course we took a few side roads, finding my first RUFFED GROUSE of the year in Fountain Valley, and almost getting stuck up the Tom Cole Road north of Lillooet. Anyways, eventually we made it to the heli-pad on the east side of town (after a brief stop at local birder Ian Routley and his partner Vivian's beautiful house up on the hill). My Dad said his goodbyes and I hopped in the chopper with pilot Scott, Jared and Joel, and UBC Forestry student- Marianne Secrest.

As we gained altitude and headed southwest to the Stein Valley, passing over endless white mountain peaks and giant fir forests, I recalled my previous Spotted Owl work with Jared in September of last year. That trip had been my introduction to the job and to the owls... as luck would have it we ended up at "Billy Goat Creek"-- possibly one of the hardest avian field-sites to work in the province with it's 45 degree slopes, wet mossy tallus, and thick underbrush. Having said that, getting to live with a pair of Spotted Owls for 3 days and 3 nights was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.

Anyways, back to the present! Here we were heading to the Stein-- usually one of the easiest Spotty sites to work since most of the habitat is at valley bottom with a hiking trail running through it. This would have been a cake-walk in comparison if it wasn't for a fire that ripped through the valley last summer, resulting in a significant amount of dead-fall over the trail... plus the few feet of snow that remains in the area despite the early spring. I guess my point is that because of habitat mismanagement and the range-expansion and aggressiveness of Barred Owls, Canada's Spotted Owls now only exist in remote areas that are very hard for average human beings to access. And we also realized too late that we should have brought snow-shoes!

After an awesome heli-ride we touched down near our first campsite where a pair of Spotties had been detected last year. That evening we split into two groups: Joel and I heading one way up the valley, and Jared and Marianne heading the other way. It was tough going in the deep snow and burned areas but we managed nonetheless. After a couple unsuccessful hours at our end of the survey area, Jared came onto the radio quietly exclaiming that the had found a pair of Spotted Owls about 3 KM downriver from us! With nothing happening in our area we hopped, ran, fell, climbed, and swore as we ducked and scrambled our way past burnt logs, scree slopes, and creeks concealed by snow. Eventually, sweating like crazy we met up with the other two just in time to see both birds! Oh what a sight! The male gave his 4 part hoot, then the female responded with a "kuu-weeeep!" call, then they both chattered away in a manner somewhat similar to excited Barred Owls... definitely in courtship mode we thought. Perhaps they will attempt nesting this year! Before heading back to camp I captured a short video of the female (TOP RIGHT OF BLOG PAGE)-- perhaps the last time a Spotted Owl will be filmed in Canada... I sincerely hope not. There are so few of these birds left in BC (probably less than 10) so a moment like this, as brief as it was is truly special, and I wanted to share it with everyone. It is possible that this is the last pair in Canada since the female I saw last fall near Billy Goat recently passed away.

So why have Spotted Owls become so scarce in BC? They rely on old-growth fir and cedar forests for nesting and hunting opportunities, and due to unchecked logging practices in the past and present this habitat-type has been severely degraded and fragmented across southwestern BC. Check out my dad's recent blog entry from March 17-- he gives a great account of the species' status and sums things up most appropriately: http://dickcannings.shawwebspace.ca/blog/

On our way back to camp I was riding high on the "Spotted Owl Cloud" -- nothing else mattered. Well, hearing a pack of wolves sounding off 1 km up the valley was pretty thrilling... but I had just seen THE OWLS again! I was so lucky to be with them again, and with such knowledgeable people like Jared and Joel who have worked with these birds for over 10 years.

March 18/19- Today we moved to a new camp down river. In past years, another pair of Spotted Owls nested in a broken cottonwood near the river (the first time this species has been recorded nesting in this tree in North America). Here titanic groves of fir, spruce, cedar, cottonwood, and pine dominated the valley bottom where the Stein River meanders back and forth providing a perfect home for countless pairs of American Dippers and many other creatures. Unfortunately no Spotted Owls were detected in our two and a half days here. Several other owls made appearances though-- 3 Norther Pygmy Owls, 3 Barred Owls, and 2 Northern Saw-whet Owls (including 1 that called well into the day). Spring is here! Everywhere we went Varied Thrushes, American Robins, and Winter Wrens belted out their songs, and on the evening of the 19th I heard a SOOTY GROUSE giving its hooting display (another year bird!).

We flew out on the 20th but took a long route to Lillooet in order to map out some other fires and look for some possible snake den sites. While flying particularly close to a hillside east of Lytton a noticed a female DUSKY GROUSE flush and fly up the hill-- another year bird and a new helicopter tick!!!

What a trip... I'm falling asleep as I write this so I hope the story has been readable. I really hope I can tell you all about the owls in person as I make my way around the province this year as they are truly the most endearing and trusting owls I have encountered while travelling North America and other parts of the world. If only there was a feasible way to ensure the survival of future generations in the wilds of BC.

March 14: Grassland Bonanza

2010-03-14T21:35:00.001-07:00

This morning Jared and I got up early to hike around the grasslands to see what we could see. Turns out there are some gems to be had! WESTERN MEADOWLARKS sang in every directions, a few newly arrived male MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRDS flitted from sage to sage inspecting the ground for insects, and several small groups of SHARP-TAILED GROUSE flushed up totaling at least 14 birds.

The rest of the morning was taken up by one bird and one bird alone. One of those moments that birders and nature-lovers alike dream about...

As we drove down a dusty road Jared pointed out a lump just ahead perched atop a fence-line. "Just a weird rock placed up there?" we thought, but we drew nearer I could tell "the shape" was that of a large falcon; "too big to be real," I thought. "No, it IS a falcon! Stop! Stop! Stop!" Staring at us from up on the hill was the biggest GYRFALCON either of us had ever seen. After ooing and awwing out of the back window of the truck, Jared concocting a plan for photography. I would ease the truck back up the hill while Jared set-up his heavy-duty equipment in the box and get ready to fire. But as we got into position the bird flushed off the fence post and flew across the road about 50 meters in front of us. For a few moments our hearts sank as we watched the bird fly away. But then it suddenly turned and came towards us only to land on a rock just meters from the road. As we crept nearer it became obvious that "she" had some prey splayed out on the boulder and we watched with glee and delight as a drake Mallard was devoured. I'll let Jared's photos speak for themselves! I shot a few out the window and have included one, but to really show-off this gorgeous bird only the best will do! Although I have seen gyrs rip up pigeons several times, never have I experienced such a large individual and so close! Not to mention the great light and awesome natural surroundings.

A great weekend up in the Thompson!

March 13: Tranquille Creek

2010-03-14T21:09:00.000-07:00

After driving up to Kamloops from Penticton on Friday (and finding some goodies like Iceland Gull in Kelowna and 5 Eurasian Wigeons near Armstrong), I joined Jared Hobbs and some TRU grad students on a rattlesnake hike up Tranquille Creek. It was a beautiful day for a hike and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves up there. Bird-wise there wasn't a heck of a lot, but here and there we found some good stuff. There were good numbers of thrushes showing signs of spring fever including several VARIED THRUSH, many piping TOWNSEND'S SOLITAIRES, and of course good numbers of robins. Raptors were in good evidence as well including a couple RED-TAILED HAWKS, several GOLDEN and BALD EAGLES, a MERLIN (and probable nest), and best of all a new year bird... what a beauty!--- a flyby PRAIRIE FALCON!!! #190 for the year and the first Prairie I've seen since early 2008.

March 8/9: More Okanagan birding

2010-03-09T21:04:00.000-08:00

March 8:

On Monday, Denny and I spent most of our time searching for grouse up in the hills above Penticton. In terms of grouse we were unsuccessful but once again we found hordes of nuthatches as well as a good mix of other forest species. Boy was a cold wind blowing today! We tried watching for Prairie Falcons around the Throne but the wind made things very unpleasant so we retreated to the car and cruised the Oliver feedlot-- where we found the male RUSTY BLACKBIRD who is now coming into alternate plumage, difficult to spot especially in poor light! On the drive home we spotted a single (Tundra) GREATER WHITE-FRONTED GOOSE feeding with Canadas near Vaseux Lake.

Tonight we tried something different, instead of hitting all the same places for Boreal Owl we hiked off-road to the far end of the Ellis Creek Reservoir. It was a chilly night up there-- at least -15 by my estimation-- but the stars, the Milky Way, Mars, and even the International Space Station made things quite beautiful. But how about the birds? Well... nothing doing once again. We did here one whistled note that could have been a Boreal Owl but it came from the opposite end of the reservoir so certainly not what we were hoping for. A distant pack of coyotes were about the only other living things we detected up there.

March 9:

Today Chris Dale and I headed north to Kelowna to tour around some of the hotspots. We stopped by Strathcona Park on the lake where several thousand gulls were scattered on the beach and out on the lake. Mostly Cals of course, but 4 other species were present as well as a few groups of migrant dabblers. Next it was up Beaver Lake Road where the grasslands yielded almost nothing (crazy considering the lovely sun and recent reports of phoebes, bluebirds etc. from a couple days ago here!). Up in the forest however we started putting up a good list including a flock of VARIED THRUSHES (one pictured), many MOUNTAIN and BLACK-CAPPED CHICKADEES, PINE SISKENS, RED-BREASTED NUTHATCHES, as well as a couple HAIRY WOODPECKERS, DOWNY WOODPECKERS, 3 GOLDEN EAGLES, a PILEATED WOODPECKERS, and a distant flock of what I'm sure were COMMON REDPOLLS (getting a little late for these guys).

Further up on the Dee Lake Road we ran into a couple AMERICAN THREE-TOED WOODPECKERS, a single NORTHERN PYGMY-OWL, a BROWN CREEPER, and best of all-- 3 BOREAL CHICKADEES (pictured... out of focus unfortunately).

We tried for Black-backs up Gillard Creek but the sun started going down and the birds were going to bed so... we called it a day. Getting quite chilly too!

Here's hoping a day back in the south OK will be warmer tomorrow!

March 7: Ptarmigan Hunt

2010-03-09T20:51:00.000-08:00

This morning and early afternoon Denny Hodsdon and I birded the upper reaches of the Ashnola River Road hoping to relocate Chris and Ryan's famous ptarmigan. We parked at KM 46 alongside several other trucks-- yes unfortunately we shared ptarmigan country with ~12 snow mobiles. We walked the track up to KM 48, taking a few side trips through the deep snow (pictured) then turned back.

As expected there were lots of ptarmigan sign: tracks, tracks, and more tracks, droppings, and wing-markings. Despite all this fresh sign though we couldn't find any actual birds... I bet those machines flushed them off the path JUST before we got there. But it wasn't all failure; no we did get some nice birds. The forest below the clearcuts was chalk-full of AMERICAN THREE-TOED WOODPECKERS drumming and calling away; I figured there were at least 11 along a 2 km stretch. Also in there were a couple HAIRY WOODPECKERS, a single PILEATED WOODPECKER, a calling male GREAT HORNED OWL, flocks of MOUNTAIN CHICKADEES (pictured), and a flyover GRAY-CROWNED ROSYFINCH.

Another great highlight came after we had accepted defeat and started driving down the hill-- from the roadside a bird with white outer tail feathers flushed and landed 50 meters further along... a junco I thought? Better check......... after a bit of scrutiny it dawned on us that it was a SNOW BUNTING albeit a very drab one (first-winter female?). Down on the road collecting grit evidently, and BC Year Bird # 189 (not counting grouse sp.)!!!

Later on in the evening we joined up with Chris Dale of Squamish for another bout of Boreal Owling. When we got up to Ellis Dam it was raining lightly but eventually it cleared off. Very quiet at the dam and throughout most of the evening. The only for-sure owl species we recorded was a BARRED OWL calling at KM 27 on the 201 Rd. We also heard several mystery noises including a possible NORTHERN PYGMY-OWL at the dam (rarely heard at night), a possible BOREAL OWL at Rabbit Lake (gave 4 rapid toot notes then shut up), and another bird that hooted repeatedly near Rabbit Lake but couldn't be tracked down. My best guess is that it was a female GREAT HORNED OWL giving a begging call from the nest. While we explored the Rabbit Lake area it was a very peaceful night, what with the quiet boreal forest and the large flakes beginning to fall all around us, captured in our torched beams... what am I thinking? I'm supposed to be finding a Boreal Owl for Denny, no time for relaxation! A couple more hours of effort revealed nothing. What is happening up here? Are the Barred Owls eating everything? I guess we'll have to go out again tomorrow night!

March 5/6: Owling and more Okanagan birding

2010-03-09T20:42:00.000-08:00

This morning we birded the southern part of the valley concentrating mostly in the upper elevations. First we spent an hour patrolling the back roads of Summerland and Penticton trying to find a Bohemian Waxwing (a novelty bird for an Arizonite). After seeing 400 in my parents’ yard 3 days ago, it seems as if these birds have mostly departed north. Anybody else see any today? Anyways, we did eventually get 1-- staked out at Mom and Dad's front yard... this guy must have squeezed out a couple extra minutes at the bird bath and missed the flock!

Next we headed up Shuttleworth (out of OK Falls) where the sunshine provided great conditions for birding. Loads of GRAY JAYS and CLARK'S NUTCRACKERS (pictured) everywhere we went, and the juncos have moved up there already. I suppose the top three highlights up there were a single male PINE GROSBEAK (great in the sun!), a soaring adult NORTHERN GOSHAWK (ditto), and a drumming AMERICAN THREE-TOED WOODPECKER. We also heard several singing BROWN CREEPERS and flushed an unIDed grouse... pah.

On our drive down we stopped at km 3 hoping to whistle up a Black-back but instead we had to settle for all 3 species of nuthatch, a western bluebird, and a small flock of red crossbills all in the same small fir tree! At one point there were 8 WHITE-BREASTED NUTHATCHES (pictured) in the same tree-- what a treat!

I finally found my year-bird SAY'S PHOEBE singing at the classic spot at the gravel-end of River Road in Oliver, then we moved along to Osoyoos Lake where no yellow-billed loons were to be found. Scoping conditions were perfect but 6 COMMON LOONS was our best attempt (including 1 bird in close to full breeding plumage).

Then it was up Anarchist to follow in Doug's footsteps; first we cruised through Regal Ridge with not much doing, then up around Sidley Mountain Road where my year-bird MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRDS we waiting, along with a few WESTERN MEADOWLARKS, and a couple RED-TAILED HAWKS and BALD EAGLES (unfortunately no Harlan's detected!). A side-trip through "downtown" Bridesville produced another surprise SAY'S PHOEBE as well as hoards of RED-WINGED BLACKBIRDS (waiting patiently for their marshes to unfreeze). Then it was onto the Bridesville-Rock Creek Back Road which didn't turn up much out of the ordinary on our first pass, but when we returned just after dark we picked up a beauty--- GREAT GRAY OWL (pictured), perched in a Ponderosa Pine right beside the road. Not a bad way to finish the day, and good to see that these birds are still in the area after Doug Brown found them breeding here last spring.

Chasing Chris and Ryan's ptarmies tomorra!

Boreal Owl and another Great Gray!

2010-03-06T23:07:00.000-08:00

Hey gang,

The last couple days and nights have been grand! I've been out birding with an Arizonian (Arizonite?) over the last couple days and the highlights have been endless... will post new photos and a full update on Monday when the dust has settled. Just a little taste: Last night we heard a Boreal Owl at close range but could not get a look, then tonight we spotted a Great Gray Owl on the side of the road and got fantastic looks-- a lifer for my friend! A few other year birds today including SAY'S PHOEBE and MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRD (also grouse sp...)

Stay tuned!

russ

#184: Western Screech-Owl

2010-03-05T11:02:00.000-08:00

Last night I decided it was high time to go pick up a screech-owl so I drove over to one of my favourite spots near White Lake and within 2 minutes the male responded. Let's hope everything else will be that easy!

Boreal Owl hunting this weekend-- wish me luck!

Russ

Full Bird List Now Available

2010-03-04T14:11:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone,

I've uploaded my full year list to most of the yahoo groups around the province so feel free to check it out... still some easy ones left before spring as you can see! It is located in the Russell Big Year Folder-- should be obvious.

Lots of bird action around the feeder lately including a family of red crossbills, a townsend's solitaire, loads of bohemian waxwings, and lots of the other stuff.

I've been spending too much time in the office, time to go find some owls!

Russ

#183 Western Meadowlark

2010-03-01T14:27:00.000-08:00

At least 1 meadowlark has returned to the grasslands behind my parents' house in Penticton. A lovely sign of things to come.

Should get some swallows, Say's Phoebe, and Mountain Bluebird soon!

NEW POLL NOW AVAILABLE!

2010-02-24T09:51:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone,

Well it looks like the Spotted Owl pulled out a tight victory, barely beating Horned Puffin and the "most wanted BC bird."

I have made a new poll which I suppose it geared a little more to the "twitchers" in the crowd. Nonetheless, I expect some thoughtful guesses (although I know some of you will just pick the one with the coolest name!). So what is this about? I have assembled a list of some likely candidates for BC's next "first record." It's up to you to guess which one will arrive here first!

Have fun,

Russ