Monday, February 18, 2019

Eagles to Ducks Family Day Weekend

Sunday, I ventured into SW Middlesex County to look around.  I was interested in seeing a Golden Eagle.  They regularly winter around Skunk's Misery and near the county line north of there and west of Glencoe.  For whatever reason, they have been hanging out there for many years!
I did not have as much luck as other birders seem to be having (nothing new there) as I drove around endlessly for some time.

Scene from the old bridge on Cameron Road
Eventually I did finally see an immature bird soaring around, albeit from a distance.



I was likely there too early in the day as they were roosting somewhere.  Some observers have seen up to four birds.  I have seen them before during winter, but I wanted to check them out now.

Ninebark
During my time in Middlesex, I got out for a walk off Sassafras Road on my favourite trail.  A few birds were seen/heard including one of the Hermit Thrushes I saw a couple of weeks ago.

After seeing the Golden Eagle, I headed straight west on Oil Springs Line out to the St. Clair River.  From there to the north end of Port Lambton, there was an astounding number of ducks.  Most I have seen in a while!  Perhaps 25,000+ ducks were visible and it was impossible to look at them all.

Scene from McKeough Outlet


During the week, there were lots of ducks early morning off Port Lambton.  An indication many more had shown up.

"Cans"


There was an impressive concentration of ducks around Fawn Island and Sombra, many of which were Long-tailed.  It would be interesting to know how many Long-tailed are around, but certainly at least 10,000.  A number of years ago, during a cold winter, I calculated around 36,000 of these attractive creatures in the Sarnia area alone.  Unprecedented!



I did not find any rarities, but I am sure something of interest is out there.  A Harlequin, or even a King Eider may be lurking around.  Stretching it, there may even be a Tufted Duck!




Today, we had to deal with a dumping of snow.  The farther north one went, there was more snow.  The parks (parking areas) along the St. Clair River are glare ice, so some were inaccessible due to the wacky weather of the past week.  We certainly got way more snow last night than was predicted (nothing new there) and that compounded with the ice, that made certain places impossible to access.  I did try one park, but barely got myself out!  I only went as far as Courtright and decided to turn around due to the conditions. (And it was not even a weekend day!)



I did stop to look at the ducks at Fawn Island.  An impressive raft of Long-tailed floated by at one point.




Around 30 Tundra Swans were at the head of Fawn Island, mixed in with Mutes.  I could not pick out a Trumpeter, but a couple of those have been around this winter.

Some White-winged Scoters have been around--I saw four at Sombra yesterday.

"Scooters"


I stopped by the Sombra ferry(less) dock area as well.  I managed to pick out one of the Redhead X Ring-necked male hybrid.  This bird returns to the area every winter.  Other hybrids have been seen as well.





I continued up to Courtright when I decided to turn around due to the snow and ice.  There was no place to safely pull off the road up that way anyway.

Around noon, I went out to Mitchell's Bay to walk the south shore trail.  A few birds were around including some American Robins feeding on roses.




The redpolls are still hanging out near the park area, but they did not co-operate today!



Here at home, the feeders were busier than they have been the last five weeks.  I have had virtually nothing coming to the feeders this winter, something I have not seen in the 30+ years I have been feeding the birds.  It is a mystery!


Red Nut



2 comments:

  1. Yep....even weekdays can have less than desirable weather. But glad you got out. That is an impressive number of ducks along the St. Clair.

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    1. Usually holidays though....lol!
      At least the skies were clear and the sun was out today.

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