Canada.com, Canada – Aug 28, 2014
Elizabeth Le Geyt, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Monday, August 27, 2014
Although the summer seems to be slipping into an early fall, there is still plenty of interesting birding around Ottawa and in Grand Manan, N.B., and Machias Island.
Wilson Hum spent some time on Machias Island, in the Gulf of Maine, where the puffins, common murres and razorbills nest.
He was able to get close-up pictures of adult puffins returning from a fishing trip with their bills full of sand eels. Breeding puffins have large triangular orange, yellow and grey bills, black and white plumage and orange legs. The nickname “sea parrot” comes from the spectacular bill. This bill has grooves in it that enable the bird to carry six or seven sand eels at the same time.
The chicks can eat their weight in eels a day and may consume as many as 2,000 during their time in the sandy burrow.
There used to be Arctic terns nesting on the island but they have moved away. Mr. Hum saw two of them but not on the island. All the shearwaters, a northern gannet, black-legged kittiwakes and black guillemots were seen.
At Mud Lake, Mr. Hum saw a merlin catch a tree swallow in flight, one great blue and three black-crowned night herons in the same tree. As many as 10 migrating nighthawks flew over.
Kathy Bissett has been in the Canadian High Arctic in a Russian research ship. She saw the three jaegers, including the long-tailed like the one that was recently seen in Ottawa. Fulmars, glaucous gulls, black guillemots and black-legged kittiwakes were on Bylot Island.
Large numbers of dovekies that nest in Greenland were flying over Baffin Bay. There were families of common eiders and red-throated loons on the Arctic ponds. The dovekie is an 18-centimetre, chunky black and white bird, the smallest of the alcids (auks, puffins and skuas). They travel in flocks of many thousands.
The reports of chimney swifts in Winnipeg prompted a call from Julia Capriani. She reported a sizable colony of these birds in a chimney in Chinatown belonging to the Dominican Fathers that has been there for many years. She said that she has seen as many as 200 of these cigar-shaped brown birds in the spring.
Saul Bocian saw the gray jays in Algonquin Park. The park naturalist told him that global warming is having a harmful effect on these birds. They store food for the winter and it needs to be kept frozen. The warmer temperatures are causing it to thaw and become inedible or even poisonous.
A correction: Peter Campbell saw a white-tailed eagle take a fulmar from the cliff face, not a gyrfalcon.
Ted Busby found at least 100 least sandpipers, semi-palmated plovers, greater and lesser yellowlegs at Shirleys Bay and Ottawa Beach. He watched a peregrine falcon attack a wood duck and saw a merlin perched in a tree. A juvenile cormorant was sunning itself in
Andrew Haydon Park. Juvenile birds have a light streak down the front of the neck.
Bryan Shane reported two kestrels in Ottawa. Terry Kojtila in Almonte says the evening grosbeaks are back at her feeder. Gary Fairhead watched a northern harrier hunting low over the cattails on Petrie Island. Gerard Cleary saw two ospreys fishing off Bate Island, and Don Wigle reported the redstart is still in the Britannia Woods with yellow and black-and-white warblers.
Tony Beck has an interesting program of bird expeditions planned for the fall. He is offering a package deal for any interested birders who would like to go on all the day outings and the occasional overnight trip.
Call him at 613-828-5936 or e-mail him at beck.tony@sympatico.ca for information. His website has all the details of the planned expeditions (www3.sympatico.ca/beck.tony).
Enjoy all the activity around the movement of the birds with their grown-up families, preparing for
migration.
Please send birding reports and specify
location to 613-821-9880 or e-mail elegeyt@rogers.com. The Wild Bird Care Centre for orphaned and injured birds is at 613-828-2849.
© The Ottawa Citizen 2014
