Point Pelee Part 3: The Places
May 20th, 2010
Eastern Towhee at Rondeau Provincial Park
Day one: Oshawa Second Marsh (was supposed to be Hillman Marsh)
Day two: Point Pelee (the point itself in the morning, Tilden Woods in the afternoon)
Day two, early evening: Hillman Marsh
Day three: Rondeau Provincial Park, morning and afternoon
Day four: Thickson Woods (near Toronto), briefly, en route to home
The decision of whether to take camera or binos, on any given birding outing, is often a difficult one. The binos are far better for in-the-moment enjoyment and for spotting, while the camera gives me more tangible memories to enjoy afterwards, and more to share with friends. This time the decision was agonizing. I can't do both and do justice to both: one must take priority, with the other stowed at my side or, ideally, left back at the hotel room. (They are just too unwieldy to carry them both around my neck.)
I ended up deciding to use binos for the first two days, and camera for the last two. On the binos days, the camera stayed on the bus or in the hotel room. What I didn't realize is that none of the other locations we birded could even hold a candle to Point Pelee. There was no comparison. Not just because there were far fewer birds and less variety of birds, but because, especially at Rondeau, most of the birds were breeders, not migrants. Breeders go about their business, often in the very tops of trees, and aren't necessarily that conspicuous unless you catch them singing--and again, they often sing at the tops of trees. Migrants flit around visibly, forage actively, as they fuel up for the next migration step, sometimes coming down much lower than they would during breeding time. They aren't "settled in", as it were. So, in sum: got a few good pictures, but not as many as I was hoping for.
If I had realized all that, would I have done things differently? Well...probably not. Point Pelee was a visceral thrill, and if I'd been in photographer mode, that thrill would have been seriously dampened. I would have missed a lot of birds, the ones I didn't miss, I probably wouldn't have seen as well, and I would have been too busy focusing on the work of photography to have all the "oh my god, that's my very first [x], it's beautiful!" moments.
All this means, of course, that I must go back. I must go back so I can take pictures, and I must go back just because. Because Point Pelee was breathtaking. I've never heard so much birdsong at once, as soon as I got off the bus. I've never seen anywhere near so many different species in one day. And all that said, one of the most thrilling moments was not about birds or not just about birds: it was when I came out onto the very tip tip of southern Ontario. Vast expanses of open water all around me, and a thick morning mist hanging over it. No far shore visible anywhere, not even after the sunrise burned the mist off. Everywhere I looked the world dropped off. Just off the point, huge swirling flocks of gulls and terns and cormorants dove for fish. It was magical. It felt like being at the ocean. The Great Lakes should be called freshwater seas.
Let me just cut to the chase and give you the full species list. Here are the birds I personally found during the four-day trip--including en route. Lifers are starred; birds that were only heard, not seen, are marked with carets.
Warblers
American Redstart
Bay-Breasted Warbler
Black-And-White Warbler
Black-Throated Blue Warbler
Black-Throated Green Warbler
Blackburnian Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Canada Warbler
*Cape May Warbler
Chestnut-Sided Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
Magnolia Warbler
Nashville Warbler
^Northern Parula
Orange-Crowned Warbler
^Ovenbird
Palm Warbler
Tennessee Warbler
Wilson's Warbler
Yellow Warbler
Yellow-Rumped Warbler
Others
American Coot
American Crow
American Goldfinch
American Robin
American Wigeon
Baltimore Oriole
Bank Swallow
Barn Swallow
^Belted Kingfisher
*Black-Bellied Plover
Black-Capped Chickadee
Blue Jay
Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher
Blue-Headed Vireo
Blue-Winged Teal
Bonaparte's Gull
Brown-Headed Cowbird
Canada Goose
^Carolina Wren
*Caspian Tern
Cedar Waxwing
Chimney Swift
Chipping Sparrow
Common Grackle
Common Nighthawk
Common Tern
Double-Crested Cormorant
Downy Woodpecker
*Dunlin
Eastern Kingbird
Eastern Towhee
Eastern Wood-Pewee
European Starling
*Forster's Tern
Gadwall
Gray Catbird
Great Blue Heron
^Great Crested Flycatcher
Great Egret
Herring Gull
House Sparrow
*House Wren
Indigo Bunting
Killdeer
Least Flycatcher
Lesser Yellowlegs
*Lincoln's Sparrow
*Little Gull
Mallard
Mourning Dove
Northern Cardinal
^Northern Flicker
Northern Harrier
Northern Rough-Winged Swallow
Northern Shoveler
*Orchard Oriole
Osprey
Purple Martin
Red-Bellied Woodpecker
Red-Eyed Vireo
Red-Headed Woodpecker
Red-Tailed Hawk
Red-Winged Blackbird
Ring-Billed Gull
Rock Pigeon
Rose-Breasted Grosbeak
Ruby-Crowned Kinglet
Ruby-Throated Hummingbird
^Savannah Sparrow
Scarlet Tanager
Short-Billed Dowitcher
Song Sparrow
Swainson's Thrush
^Swamp Sparrow
*Trumpeter Swan
^Tufted Titmouse
Turkey Vulture
Veery
Warbling Vireo
White-Breasted Nuthatch
White-Crowned Sparrow
White-Eyed Vireo
White-Throated Sparrow
Wild Turkey
^Wood Thrush
That's 96 species seen, 10 heard, and 10 lifers. Of those, 70 were seen/heard at Point Pelee in one day, including all 21 of the warblers.
Point Pelee is a place where migrant birds have just finished their trip across lake Erie. Assuming they're songbirds, that means not stopping once across the whole stretch, because songbirds can't swim (except for the rare oddity like the American Dipper). So when they arrive on the far shore, they crash--the way we all did at the hotel at 10:45pm--and they stay put for awhile. That's why Point Pelee rocks.
There is another reason why this whole region is famous with Canadian birders and Canadian naturalists: it comprises the far-northern tip of the Carolinian forest region. That means a very different assortment of trees, wildflowers, insects, reptiles, and last but not least breeding birds than we see up in places like Ottawa. Having grown up in Virginia, I was particularly amused by the big to-do about ticks. Far-southern Ontario has ticks. There was a lecture about it on the bus--what they look like, how to get them off once they've dug in, how to do tick checks--and the awed reverence with which people treated the subject made me smile. Just wait'll you meet chiggers, folks. You ain't seen nothing yet.
There are a number of interesting birds whose breeding range extends into Point Pelee but not much further north. Birds who are basically linked to the Carolinian forest. So while we come to Pelee for the migrants, we also come for those southern breeders that we can't find (or can only find with great difficulty) back home. Rondeau Provincial Park is one of the top places to see them. The one disappointment of the trip was how few of them I saw--in particular, I saw not a single one of the many southern warblers (to wit, Golden-Winged, Blue-Winged, Brewster's, Prothonotary, Hooded, Worm-Eating, Prairie, Kentucky, Yellow-Breasted Chat, Louisiana Waterthrush) that I had been hoping and rather expecting to see, all of whom would have been lifers. Many of them were around; I was just unlucky. Some in my group had better luck--some even saw the ultra-rare, endangered Kirtland's Warbler that showed up at Point Pelee on Friday--but I never happened to be in the right sub-group at the right time.
I choose to look on the bright side. If I tick off every possible lifer at high speed, I will soon get to the point where I have to go on long trips to the western provinces, or even other countries, to see something new. I have my whole life to enjoy this hobby. There's no rush.
And there will--I repeat, THERE WILL--be future trips to Point Pelee in May! And I will be awake and ready at oh five four five in the morning to go see the birds at Point Pelee in May!
In the remaining parts, I'll talk about some of the interesting species I saw, and share the rest of my photos.
May 20th, 2010
Eastern Towhee at Rondeau Provincial Park
Day one: Oshawa Second Marsh (was supposed to be Hillman Marsh)
Day two: Point Pelee (the point itself in the morning, Tilden Woods in the afternoon)
Day two, early evening: Hillman Marsh
Day three: Rondeau Provincial Park, morning and afternoon
Day four: Thickson Woods (near Toronto), briefly, en route to home
The decision of whether to take camera or binos, on any given birding outing, is often a difficult one. The binos are far better for in-the-moment enjoyment and for spotting, while the camera gives me more tangible memories to enjoy afterwards, and more to share with friends. This time the decision was agonizing. I can't do both and do justice to both: one must take priority, with the other stowed at my side or, ideally, left back at the hotel room. (They are just too unwieldy to carry them both around my neck.)
I ended up deciding to use binos for the first two days, and camera for the last two. On the binos days, the camera stayed on the bus or in the hotel room. What I didn't realize is that none of the other locations we birded could even hold a candle to Point Pelee. There was no comparison. Not just because there were far fewer birds and less variety of birds, but because, especially at Rondeau, most of the birds were breeders, not migrants. Breeders go about their business, often in the very tops of trees, and aren't necessarily that conspicuous unless you catch them singing--and again, they often sing at the tops of trees. Migrants flit around visibly, forage actively, as they fuel up for the next migration step, sometimes coming down much lower than they would during breeding time. They aren't "settled in", as it were. So, in sum: got a few good pictures, but not as many as I was hoping for.
If I had realized all that, would I have done things differently? Well...probably not. Point Pelee was a visceral thrill, and if I'd been in photographer mode, that thrill would have been seriously dampened. I would have missed a lot of birds, the ones I didn't miss, I probably wouldn't have seen as well, and I would have been too busy focusing on the work of photography to have all the "oh my god, that's my very first [x], it's beautiful!" moments.
All this means, of course, that I must go back. I must go back so I can take pictures, and I must go back just because. Because Point Pelee was breathtaking. I've never heard so much birdsong at once, as soon as I got off the bus. I've never seen anywhere near so many different species in one day. And all that said, one of the most thrilling moments was not about birds or not just about birds: it was when I came out onto the very tip tip of southern Ontario. Vast expanses of open water all around me, and a thick morning mist hanging over it. No far shore visible anywhere, not even after the sunrise burned the mist off. Everywhere I looked the world dropped off. Just off the point, huge swirling flocks of gulls and terns and cormorants dove for fish. It was magical. It felt like being at the ocean. The Great Lakes should be called freshwater seas.
Let me just cut to the chase and give you the full species list. Here are the birds I personally found during the four-day trip--including en route. Lifers are starred; birds that were only heard, not seen, are marked with carets.
Warblers
American Redstart
Bay-Breasted Warbler
Black-And-White Warbler
Black-Throated Blue Warbler
Black-Throated Green Warbler
Blackburnian Warbler
Blackpoll Warbler
Canada Warbler
*Cape May Warbler
Chestnut-Sided Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
Magnolia Warbler
Nashville Warbler
^Northern Parula
Orange-Crowned Warbler
^Ovenbird
Palm Warbler
Tennessee Warbler
Wilson's Warbler
Yellow Warbler
Yellow-Rumped Warbler
Others
American Coot
American Crow
American Goldfinch
American Robin
American Wigeon
Baltimore Oriole
Bank Swallow
Barn Swallow
^Belted Kingfisher
*Black-Bellied Plover
Black-Capped Chickadee
Blue Jay
Blue-Gray Gnatcatcher
Blue-Headed Vireo
Blue-Winged Teal
Bonaparte's Gull
Brown-Headed Cowbird
Canada Goose
^Carolina Wren
*Caspian Tern
Cedar Waxwing
Chimney Swift
Chipping Sparrow
Common Grackle
Common Nighthawk
Common Tern
Double-Crested Cormorant
Downy Woodpecker
*Dunlin
Eastern Kingbird
Eastern Towhee
Eastern Wood-Pewee
European Starling
*Forster's Tern
Gadwall
Gray Catbird
Great Blue Heron
^Great Crested Flycatcher
Great Egret
Herring Gull
House Sparrow
*House Wren
Indigo Bunting
Killdeer
Least Flycatcher
Lesser Yellowlegs
*Lincoln's Sparrow
*Little Gull
Mallard
Mourning Dove
Northern Cardinal
^Northern Flicker
Northern Harrier
Northern Rough-Winged Swallow
Northern Shoveler
*Orchard Oriole
Osprey
Purple Martin
Red-Bellied Woodpecker
Red-Eyed Vireo
Red-Headed Woodpecker
Red-Tailed Hawk
Red-Winged Blackbird
Ring-Billed Gull
Rock Pigeon
Rose-Breasted Grosbeak
Ruby-Crowned Kinglet
Ruby-Throated Hummingbird
^Savannah Sparrow
Scarlet Tanager
Short-Billed Dowitcher
Song Sparrow
Swainson's Thrush
^Swamp Sparrow
*Trumpeter Swan
^Tufted Titmouse
Turkey Vulture
Veery
Warbling Vireo
White-Breasted Nuthatch
White-Crowned Sparrow
White-Eyed Vireo
White-Throated Sparrow
Wild Turkey
^Wood Thrush
That's 96 species seen, 10 heard, and 10 lifers. Of those, 70 were seen/heard at Point Pelee in one day, including all 21 of the warblers.
Point Pelee is a place where migrant birds have just finished their trip across lake Erie. Assuming they're songbirds, that means not stopping once across the whole stretch, because songbirds can't swim (except for the rare oddity like the American Dipper). So when they arrive on the far shore, they crash--the way we all did at the hotel at 10:45pm--and they stay put for awhile. That's why Point Pelee rocks.
There is another reason why this whole region is famous with Canadian birders and Canadian naturalists: it comprises the far-northern tip of the Carolinian forest region. That means a very different assortment of trees, wildflowers, insects, reptiles, and last but not least breeding birds than we see up in places like Ottawa. Having grown up in Virginia, I was particularly amused by the big to-do about ticks. Far-southern Ontario has ticks. There was a lecture about it on the bus--what they look like, how to get them off once they've dug in, how to do tick checks--and the awed reverence with which people treated the subject made me smile. Just wait'll you meet chiggers, folks. You ain't seen nothing yet.
There are a number of interesting birds whose breeding range extends into Point Pelee but not much further north. Birds who are basically linked to the Carolinian forest. So while we come to Pelee for the migrants, we also come for those southern breeders that we can't find (or can only find with great difficulty) back home. Rondeau Provincial Park is one of the top places to see them. The one disappointment of the trip was how few of them I saw--in particular, I saw not a single one of the many southern warblers (to wit, Golden-Winged, Blue-Winged, Brewster's, Prothonotary, Hooded, Worm-Eating, Prairie, Kentucky, Yellow-Breasted Chat, Louisiana Waterthrush) that I had been hoping and rather expecting to see, all of whom would have been lifers. Many of them were around; I was just unlucky. Some in my group had better luck--some even saw the ultra-rare, endangered Kirtland's Warbler that showed up at Point Pelee on Friday--but I never happened to be in the right sub-group at the right time.
I choose to look on the bright side. If I tick off every possible lifer at high speed, I will soon get to the point where I have to go on long trips to the western provinces, or even other countries, to see something new. I have my whole life to enjoy this hobby. There's no rush.
And there will--I repeat, THERE WILL--be future trips to Point Pelee in May! And I will be awake and ready at oh five four five in the morning to go see the birds at Point Pelee in May!
In the remaining parts, I'll talk about some of the interesting species I saw, and share the rest of my photos.
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