Nature Notes for January 30, 2015
Cobourg Harbour was completely ice-covered last
week. There should be lots of gulls roosting on the ice. Where were they?
Closer examination of a lump of ice in the middle of the harbour provided an
answer. It wasn’t ice, but a Snowy Owl. A number of Snowy Owls, first reported
in late November, are still being seen in southern Ontario.
The lakefront is a good place to look for them. From
the owls’ perspective, this looks like the tundra – open, windswept with lots
of potential prey. As well as both Cobourg and Port Hope harbours, look for
Snowy Owls on utility poles, fence posts and the tops of silos in open
agricultural areas
In the Arctic, Snowy Owls feed mostly on lemmings.
In southern Ontario, they also eat ducks. They hunt along the edge of the ice
in the big lakes and take birds weakened by the weather.
The waterfowl are not as pressed this year as they
were in 2013/14, when much food was covered by ice. Flocks of Canada Geese pass
over my house regularly. They are going inland to feed on the farm fields and
then return to Lake Ontario to roost and digest their meal. So far, the snow is
not deep and the geese are finding adequate food.
Early in the winter, there were big flocks of PineSiskins gobbling seed at many backyard feeders. They have moved further south
and have been replaced in some places by Common Redpolls, another northern
finch. Redpolls are birds of the tundra, so they usually frequent feeders in
relatively open areas. I have not seen many in my treed backyard.
I have found several quite large flocks in open
meadow areas, feeding on the weed seeds there. The birds move around a lot and
when they land, they blend in with their surroundings and become invisible.
Common Redpoll on Burr
Photo © Rob Lonsberry
In addition to the redpolls, my husband found a
large flock of sparrows moving around in an old field area just west of Port
Hope. Although the majority of the birds were American Tree Sparrows and
Dark-eyed Juncos, there were accompanied by a few other sparrow species. At
different times, there have been Song Sparrows, White-throated Sparrows,
White-crowned Sparrows, Savannah Sparrows, Chipping Sparrows and a Clay-coloredSparrow. Although several of these species are common breeders in the area,
they are quite uncommon in winter. The Clay-colored Sparrow may be the first
winter record for Ontario.
On January 17, I looked out into my garden to find a
Common Grackle eyeing the feeder. Again, this is a common species (almost a
pest) in summer, but an unusual visitor in winter. There have been small
numbers of other blackbirds reported west of Port Hope. These have included
Red-winged Blackbird, Brown-headed Cowbird and Rusty Blackbird. The Rusty
Blackbird is listed as a “Species of Special Concern” by the Committeeon the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada.
On January 18, I led a tour of bird feeders in the
area of the Northumberland Forest for Willow Beach Field Naturalists. I was
hoping that we would find Evening Grosbeaks. Three of the five feeders we
visited have had them regularly this winter. Of course, on the day of the
outing, there were none. The next day, one of the feeder hosts e-mailed me a
photo of eight Evening Grosbeaks that had come to his feeder that morning.
How was that third and last Christmas Bird Count,
the Rice Lake Plains one on January 1? It was a very cold, very windy day.
Despite the conditions, twenty-three observers and 8 feeder watchers counted
4,572 birds of 51 species. Highlights included: 2 Turkey Vultures; 1 BaldEagle; 3 Northern Harriers; 1 Lesser Black-backed Gull; 2 Glaucous Gulls; 1
Long-eared Owl; 2 Winter Wrens; 1 Hermit Thrush; 1 Common Grackle; and 29
Evening Grosbeaks. The warm soup was very welcome at the end of this cold day.
