I would never have guessed that I would be flirting with seeing no birds during the last week of April. The spring migration is in full swing and millions of birds are flooding into Ontario. Yet, last week I had a fairly poor week of birding and only saw 1 new species. That's right, I wasn't held to the big zero and my list continued to grow, albeit by only a single bird species. My new bird of the week was the Gray Catbird, which was number 127 for the year.
There were two of these catbirds lurking under a tree that I saw on my early Thursday morning bird walk (more like bushwhack) through the forest behind my house. I spent the rest of the morning tracking down a ring-necked pheasant that I could hear but I never did see. I won't count this as a sighting, even though I know a pheasant when I hear one.
The rest of my week was squandered with things like "watching my kids", "cleaning the house", "working", and "teaching bankers how to sample water quality". Yes, you heard that right-
my research lab at Trent is participating in a
$100 million project funded by the bank HSBC and run, in part, by EarthWatch with one aim of teaching bankers about our impending freshwater crisis. So yeah, no real excuse for not posting more this week.
127
Gray Catbird
5/3/2013
Loggerhead Woodlot, Peterborough, ON
My birding for the week wasn't a complete wash though. I saw some new birds in my backyard and was able to get a few more photos of my feathered friends.
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| Lesser Scaup seen on my stormwater pond. |
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| Grackle with really blue head. |
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| Killdeer taking a break from deeping. |
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| Caspian Terns found near Trent University. |
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