Outings To The Southern Corridor
April 10th, 2010
Someday, maybe someday soon, I'm going to make a website called "Birding Ottawa by Bus."
All the existing Ottawa bird guides (there are several, including a very good one called NeilyWorld) are geared (sorry) towards drivers. Bus routes often aren't even mentioned, even for sites that are reachable by bus--or the bus info is incomplete or outdated. This leaves those of us who are not car-enabled, or (like me) not car-enabled much, to try to puzzle out how we can get to all these fabulous places, or how, perhaps, we can find a substitute for [super-remote awesome birding spot] that's on a bus route and offers some of the same sightings.
I envision this guides having two sections, or rather two "views", one by site, the other by species. The guide-by-species is what I would really want. Everyone knows how to find, say, a Yellow Warbler by bus (go to Mud Lake, or Hog's Back Park, or really just about any little greenspace in Ottawa including possibly your back yard). But how about an Indigo Bunting by bus? (McCarthy Woods near the train tracks, 87.) How about a Ruffed Grouse by bus? (Old Quarry Trail, 118.) How about Meadowlarks by bus? (Yeah, how about that? Do want.)
One of the biggest gaps in my lifelist is grassland/farmland birds. Because farmland almost by definition is outlying land. Busses don't go there except for rural express, and then, of course, they go in the wrong direction--from rural in the morning, to rural at night. (There is the Experimental Farm, but that only goes so far. We're talking birds who like fallow grassy fields, tall weeds, scrub--real open country, not just crops and buildings.)
Now that I have my license, I do plan to drive out to some of those places when I get the chance. But I'm also happy to have found a quite bussable little grassland 20 minutes from where I live! It's a no-name rectangle of open, public, undeveloped land between Riverside Drive and McCarthy Road, reachable by the 87. There's a mature maple forest called McCarthy Woods--jagash and I surveyed that part last year for the OFNC Breeding Bird Count--a bushy thicket, and then a quite big area that's nothing but grass and scattered shrubs and trees, basically a meadow. The whole area is informally called "the southern corridor" by naturalists but it's otherwise practically unknown except by locals. I don't know what all breeding birds it supports, but in the coming months, I plan to find out.
The solitude is nice. After visiting big-name conservation areas like Mud Lake and Jack Pine Trail, which are absolutely crawling with birders, photographers, hikers and families in the warm months, it's refreshing to visit a little no-name chunk of land, where the only person I ever run into is the very occasional local dog-walker. And if I want to exchange that for complete solitude, all I have to do is go off the path.
And actually, this no-name chunk of land is turning out to be a pretty exciting place to bird! Two trips this spring have produced the following:
- American
Kestrel: After almost three years of birding, and after having him on my
wishlist for all of those three years, I finally found my first kestrel.
Kestrels are small, colorful grassland falcons. They're supposedly quite
common. I've searched for them numerous times at Fletcher Wildlife Garden and
the Experimental Farm (where they breed), with no luck. This one was perched
in a small tree in the meadow. I was struck by how much he looked like a plump
Mourning Dove. But chickadees don't fuss at doves, nor do doves have vertical
stripes below their eyes, to reduce the sun glare when they're hunting.
He didn't let me get close. I hope all kestrels aren't that skittish, or it could be awhile before I get a picture. Their preferred habitat does not exactly give me much in the way of camouflage!
- Great
Horned Owl: When I heard the raucous din of crows in the woods, I knew
they had to be onto something big. I followed the caws and found him in a
tree, with dozens of crows perched all around shouting at him--actually
leaning off their perches just so they could go "RAWH!" in his face. (I've
told you before, I think, how Great Horned Owl is their worst enemy. He is one
of the few birds that is big enough, strong enough, and stealthy enough to
kill and eat an adult crow.) Some of them even crept up from behind to peck at
him. But as soon as he turned around, they backed off.
While this was going on, a Turkey Vulture came by and soared quite languidly overhead, almost hovering. Perhaps he was hoping that all that noise meant "found food!", not "found an enemy!"
- Cooper's
Hawk: Remember that high-intensity redwing alarm call I described
recently? The one that caused a chickadee to make a startled sound and
immediately dive into the nearest bush? I heard it again.
It happened simultaneously with a big, crow-sized Cooper's Hawk swooping right over my head with a black bird in her talons. She landed on an arched fallen tree (a classic accipiter "plucking station") and got to work. I was able to get a good look at the prey before she plucked it. So I can report that there is now one less European Starling in the world--and one Cooper's Hawk who dined well.
Addendum: Female Cooper's Hawks are about the size of crows. Male Cooper's Hawks are about the size of doves. Female Cooper's Hawks sometimes eat birds the size of doves. This site suggests that males are thus hesitant to approach females, unless they hear the "reassuring call notes" that indicate the female is in a conjugal sort of mood, not a killing-and-eating sort of mood.
Perhaps that's why, after she was done, she perched, looked around and called a few times. "All fed, dear! You can come out now."
Luminous Spring Scilla
April 5th, 2010
I love this time of year.
I love it because this is when luscious carpets of little blue flowers--so blue they almost seem to glow--spring up in the northwest woods of Mud Lake. They're usually the first flowers I see in spring. They smell wonderful.
In past years, I wasn't "into" flowers as a naturalist (though I always enjoyed the sight) so I didn't try to identify them. Now I am. But I tried several wildflower field guides and came up empty. Google finally cleared up the mystery for me, courtesy of a comment on this page: it's scilla, specifically scilla siberica (Siberian Squill), and it's not a wildflower at all, at least not in this part of the world! It's a garden flower that spread to Mud Lake from nearby Britannia, and naturalized.
The sun was slipping in and out of the clouds. Each time it peeked out, I shot the flowers backlit. That seemed to give them the glory they deserved.
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An Afternoon at Jack Pine Trail (part 2)
April 4th, 2010
In terms of friendliness of wildlife, Jack Pine Trail is Mud Lake and then some. Ducks, geese, chickadees, nuthatches, chipmunks and squirrels have all learned, from repeated contact, that the humans there are no threat to them and may provide food on request. Even species I normally expect to be quite skittish, such as hares, grouse, and juncos, are more trusting in this area. (I once had a Ruffed Grouse at Jack Pine Trail step out from under a bush and walk right up to my feet. Alas, I didn't have a camera with me then, and I have yet to re-encounter him.)
The White-Breasted Nuthatches will stalk you, the way chickadees do at Mud Lake. Flitting from trunk to trunk as you walk by, at eye level, doing their game best to catch your attention. This makes for some excellent photo opportunities.
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The woods that day were absolutely teeming with migrant Golden-Crowned Kinglets. The most kinglets I've ever seen in one place--and that's saying something. These tiny birds, barely larger than hummingbirds, are among the forerunners in songbird spring migration. They're apparently more tolerant of cold than warblers, because they migrate earlier in the spring and later in the fall, and also winter in the states, while most warblers continue on to the tropics.
The Golden-Crowned Kinglets were doing what they usually do, which is to say, mocking me. I've told this story before. It's like a big game of keep-away. The kinglets must never give me an opportunity to photograph their little selves without ten intervening branches, or motion blur, or poor lighting, or, if they do, they tilt their heads away so I can't catch those beautiful bright yellow crown stripes. Or, if I get all those things--a Golden-Crowned Kinglet out in the open in good light showing his crown and not moving a muscle--then my camera will mysteriously fail to auto-focus on it. And then it flits away.
"Oh, you mean this golden crown?"
Slate-Colored Junco
These are the other birds that the woods were teeming with. They hopped in front of me on the path in little foraging flocks, and sang from up in the trees: an unmusical but resonant trill. Like kinglets, this is their time for moving through Ottawa on their way to their breeding grounds.
Song Sparrow
Song Sparrows are one of our most common and widespread breeding sparrows, and the first to come back in migration. They're everywhere now, singing their song of 2-3 distinct whistles followed by a trill.
Mallard
"Do I hear the sweet, sweet sound of visitors to Jack Pine Trail? And do the visitors have food for me?"
An Afternoon at Jack Pine Trail (part 1)
April 3rd, 2010
I didn't expect to see much at Jack Pine Trail this afternoon. I figured most birds and animals would be laying low, hiding from the heat.
I was wrong. It was hopping with activity.
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I was on the boardwalk when a couple of ladies came by and told me about the "wild rabbit" a little ways down the trail, who had "beautiful colors." I thanked them and walked on. This news didn't excite me much since rabbits are a dime a dozen at Mud Lake.
Then it struck me: this is deep woods and cattail marsh. There are no open, meadowy areas for cottontails to hop around in. And what did they mean "beautiful colors"? Cottontails are brown.
When I found him, my suspicion was confirmed: their "wild rabbit" was a Snowshoe Hare! One who was in the process of shedding his white winter coat for a new brown one. Not sure I'd call him beautiful in this state--dishevelled, maybe. He was much tamer (and much less nocturnal) than the hares I've seen on Old Quarry Trail, so I was able to get a close-up.
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The chipmunks are quite tame on that trail, too.
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Apologies for the close-up if you are not one of those weird people who thinks snakes = OMG CUTE. I am in fact such a person.
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Red Squirrel sez: it's hot. Way too damn hot. April 3rd. 29 degrees. Mother nature: you're fired.
American Crow sez: there are ways to beat the heat, you know.
Protein For A Muskrat
April 1st, 2010
A puzzling sight at Mud Lake yesterday. Why was a muskrat pushing a ball in front of him as he swam?
The mystery cleared up when he went ashore...
The item was in fact a freaking big bivalve. (Seriously--how does a little wetland like Mud Lake support a shellfish of that size? It looks like it belongs in the ocean!) A mussel perhaps. And he was not pushing it along, but had somehow managed to get a grip on the thing with his teeth.
He settled down, gnawed the shell open, and feasted.
And then, that was one happy muskrat. He actually splashed around in the water afterwards.
Mourning Cloak
March 31st, 2010
Mourning Cloaks are among the first butterflies to appear in the spring. They're tough to photograph well, especially when they lie camouflaged on dead leaves! I cheated with this one by stealing some saturation from the leaves and giving it to him :-)
Gilded
March 30th, 2010
Every now and then I like to remind people how beautiful common-as-dirt European Starlings really are.
Foreign Language Skills
March 28th, 2010
Sometimes you just suspect it, but then other times it's undeniable.
I had scattered sunflower seeds on a rock and a chickadee landed there to pick through them. At just that time, a red-winged blackbird some distance away, at the top of a tree, uttered a RWB-style alarm call, i.e., a call used to warn other red-winged blackbirds that a potential predator, such as a raptor, is near. (You've probably heard it before: a high-pitched piercing note, falling in tone, or sometimes three or more such notes in quick succession. The latter is a more urgent call, I suspect, and is the one he used in this case.)
The chickadee made a sort of startled chirrup, left the seeds behind, and immediately dove for cover in the nearest bush.
I was also mildly surprised and thoroughly pleased to run into a Wild Turkey at Mud Lake this morning. He was right at the start of the trail, off Cassels. He slipped away down a side path as I approached. Turkeys tend to be fairly sedentary, so there's a good chance I'll get to photograph him on some future visit before he moves on.
Wood Duck Pair at Riverain Park
March 24th, 2010
Found them again.
They're still skittish, as new arrivals so often are. They only allowed me a few shots before they got fed up and flew to the far shore.
Early Arrivals
March 23rd, 2010
Canada Geese quench their thirst at the ice edge of the Ottawa River.
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