Thursday, October 20, 2011

Van Wagners Highlights - Oct 19

I arrived at VWB around 8:30 am yesterday, and left just after 5pm. Winds were NE ~40kmh for most of the day. It was good! Not unbelievably good, but pretty darn good indeed.

Barb Charlton and I actually talked for a while about how spoiled we get by this time in the season. We really only focused on "close" birds (inside the wave tower), in sharp comparison to getting hyper excited in late August - seeing mini specks of Jaegers on the horizon.  Here's the highlights:

Red-throated & Common Loons
All 3 scoters
2 Merlins and a Peregrine
5-6 Phalarope Sp (that I missed)
1 juv Black-legged Kittiwake - visited twice during the day, for 10-15 minutes each visit
1 ad. Little Gull - a very good/fun bird for Hamilton lakewatching
1 juv. Common Tern
~3 juv Pomarine Jaegers
~3 (2 ad, 1 juv) Parasitic Jaegers
3 juv Long-tailed Jaegers 


+++ A bunch of other "Jaeger's Sp's" that I didn't really keep track of. Numbers of Poms and PAJA's were probably reasonably higher, but that is the ultra-conservative count (all of those 9 birds gave really good views "inside the wave tower")

The Merlins seemed to be migrating past. The juv Peregrine had some fun trying to grab gulls off the water, all in the morning.

The kittiwake was the first of the year for the VWB lakewatchers, and it was really nice to have it "hang around" for 10-15mins each visit. It was just inside the wave tower as well.

The juv Common Tern was seen late in the day, being chased by some Bonaparte's. Rob Dobos had spotted a distant tern maybe an hour before this sighting


Many of the Jaegers were seen several times each, as they seem to get "stuck" at our end of the lake when they arrive. The first Pom eventually met up with a juv. Long-tailed Jaeger and gave really nice views. I will have to write an extra story about these birds sometime soon (tomorrow?) --- was a learning experience.

We had a few more Pom sightings, until finally around mid-day we had 3 Parasitic Jaegers (the 2 adults and a juv) fly past inside the wave tower, making for the Jaeger tri-fecta.

Many more distant Jaegers, some confidently Pom's, happened until late in the day. Two different Juv. Long-tailed Jaegers made close passes, making for a really good count of 3 on the day. I've had LTJA's this late before, but 3 is pretty good.

--- I actually think there may have only been 1 other day where I've had all 3 Jaeger species in the same day. It involved this below Long-tailed:


Photographed in a large "flock" of passing Jaegers in terrible conditions on Oct 22, 2005. The below Pom was photographed at the same time!:


So yeah. Other than that spectacular day (all 3 Jaegers at once, yet only 1 LTJA), today was pretty remarkable in getting really good looks at 3x3 Jaeger species! 



If only we had a Gannet!

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Here's my total list I submitted to ebird:


Canada Goose  X
Mallard  X
Green-winged Teal  2
Greater Scaup  X
Lesser Scaup  X
Surf Scoter  X
White-winged Scoter  X
Black Scoter  2
Long-tailed Duck  X
Bufflehead  2
Red-breasted Merganser  X
Red-throated Loon  5
Common Loon  40
Horned Grebe  10
Double-crested Cormorant  200
Great Blue Heron  1
Northern Harrier  1
Merlin  2
Peregrine Falcon  1
Sanderling  25
Dunlin  2
Black-legged Kittiwake  1     juv
Bonaparte's Gull  75
Little Gull  1     ad
Ring-billed Gull  X
Herring Gull  X
Great Black-backed Gull  5
Common Tern  1
Pomarine Jaeger  3     juvs 3+++
Parasitic Jaeger  3     2+ ad's, 1 juv
Long-tailed Jaeger  3     juvs
jaeger sp.  3     probably many more  - only close birds named
Rock Pigeon  X
Mourning Dove  X
American Crow  X
European Starling  X
Dark-eyed Junco  5

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