Author: Peter T

23 January 2014. Burlington Ontario. A deep Arctic chill has laid its heavy hand on bird life around here.  There’s not much open water anywhere, even the usually-open ship canal is heavily choked with plates of chunk ice.  I went there to see what waterfowl might be around and in the ten minutes it took for the steely wind to cut right through me I saw lots of desperate looking ducks and gulls.

The picture above includes, (roughly from left to right) Common Goldeneye, Redheads, Mallards, Lesser Scaup and Long-tailed Ducks; there were Trumpeter Swans, Red-breasted Mergansers, Herring Gulls and Great Black-backed Gulls in the mix too.

The quest for food would be different from species to species.  Diving ducks like the Goldeneyes, Scaup, Long-tailed, Mergansers and Redheads are probably doing okay feeding on the abundant colonies of Zebra Mussels. I’m never quite sure what Mallards find to eat as they sift the water surface but presumably it’s rather like a nourishing soup so I assume they’re okay; but the Trumpeter Swans, well I don’t know what sustains them at times like this.  They’re browsers of sub-aquatic vegetation and these waters are too deep, cold and industrial for there to be any.  Gulls scavenge and will attack other weak vulnerable birds.  This first winter Great Black-backed Gull was doing quite well devouring what was probably not long before, a Lesser Scaup. Great Black-backed Gulls have few challengers, they’re the world’s largest gull, this one was clearly dining alone.

As I headed back to my car I glanced up to a site atop a bridge structure where Peregrine Falcons have nested every year for close to a decade.  Sitting silently watching over the world below was one of them.  In a month or two as the sun gains strength and days lengthen I imagine it will be pairing up.  Although it was just a solitary bird it was my Bird of the Day.  I liked the Great Black-backed Gull well enough but a Peregrine Falcon is a prize sighting any day.  Here’s a photo of perhaps the same Peregrine but in better weather. 

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13 January 2014. Sosua, Dominican Republic.  As I write this I am in a funny limbo-land that lies between handing back the key to your room and heading to the airport, Awkwardly, check-out was by noon and the flight leaves eight hours from now, close to midnight. So it’s that tricky balancing act between wearing the right things for tropical heat while anticipating an Ontario winter when I emerge into a January night not so very long from now. Still, I’ve found and claimed a shady spot with a view; there are worse problems in life.

Whiling away my time has been a peaceful birding moment. Above and to my left a northern Mockingbird sings, Greater Antillean Grackles swoop down to pick at odds and ends, and a Bananaquit visits every so often without any apparent reason; I scattered the dusty remnants of a nuts and berries mix thinking it that might appeal to its scavenger instinct, but apparently not. A couple of Turkey Vultures are circling overhead, drawn I suppose by the scattering of inert, white bodies lying around all over the place and, who knows, perhaps some of the elaborate tattoos make the scavengers circle back for a long second look; as far as I know everyone is still breathing.

Digressing again I see – so to the point. As I sat here pondering the stretch of time ahead I caught sight of a Hispaniolan Woodpecker visiting a nearby tree. I grabbed my camera certain that the very instant I’d be ready to press the shutter the bird would fly; it usually works that way. But to my delight I managed to get a couple of super shots. The Hispaniolan Woodpecker is endemic to this island (found nowhere else in the world), so it’s a nice sighting even if fairly common. Bird of the Day – here it is. I’ll soon be home.

12 January 2014. Rio San Juan, Dominican Republic.With all of my week’s ‘work’ done I felt I’d earned a day of indulgence; a visit to a birdy spot was what I needed. I consulted my ‘Rough Guide to the Dominican Republic’ and learned that the best birding is found in the south-west of the island. Hmmm…and I’m on the north coast and this is a big country (aren’t they always once you get there? Always larger than you’d envisaged from advance reading.) But I discovered that not too far from where I’m staying is a small village called Rio San Juan. The Rough Guide’s map shows a bird sanctuary and talks of boat tours around the mangrove preserve. It suggests, “…go early in the morning for better bird watching.”

It’s now obvious that I read more into it than I should. In any event I retained the service of a taxi to take me to Río San Juan and back, and negotiated with a guide to accompany me. The would-be guide shrugged when I asked him how much he charged. He suggested “Whatever you want amigo.” I pressed the point. “How much? One dollar? Twenty Dollars? Fifty dollars? How about two pesos? (he grimaced and gave me the shrug again.)  “Whatever you want amigo.” My turn to shrug; really all that I had established was that two pesos (about 5 cents) wouldn’t work and that he was genuinely leaving it up to me. So off we went.

The journey was longer than I’d expected, perhaps because it included a stop to add air to a rapidly collapsing tire as well as a visit to a roadside stand that sold a tepid whitish drink that was said to be a bit like milk – and did I want some? We had passed a few dairy farms along the way that made me feel sorry for the cows, so I wasn’t in the right frame of mind to drink anything in the least bit like milk; and besides I’d just finished breakfast -thanks.

In due course, enlightened about Dominican traffic etiquette and somewhat startled by the kamikaze relationship between motorcycles and cars, we arrived at Río San Juan. The Rio part of the name is a strong hint that there should be a river somewhere around, that’s helpful because it usually suggests wetlands, maybe an estuary and an interesting mix of birds. However I never did see a river as such, although a piped discharge of what I was assured was natural and clean water created a sizeable inland pond which in turn connected via a mangrove-lined channel to the sea beyond. This really should be where all the bird life was. I forked over a modest sum for a boat ride through the mangrove swamp and out into the large offshore swells. The oceanic bit was pleasant and our ‘captain’ took us close inshore to where the bursting waters are eating away at cliffs that look like a mouth-full of sharks’ teeth. I kept imagining how the threatening lengths of this shoreline looked to early navigators, there are plenty of long, postcard-perfect and easily accessible beaches, but where the shoreline is rocks or protected by coral reefs it would be a terrifying prospect. Christopher Columbus was one of those navigators, in fact recorded history’s earliest. He first set foot in the New World along this coast which must have looked invitingly verdant and probably made of gold.
I have digressed, perhaps because I saw the grand total of three species here. Lots of birds but deeply disappointing diversity. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of Cattle Egrets building small twiggy nests, incubating eggs and feeding young among the mangroves. My guide was proud to be able to point out a large and funereal gathering of Turkey Vultures watching from atop a dead tree and I spotted, to everyone else’s mild interest, a Yellow-crowned Night Heron; while not a first for me, it’s been several years and I was please to be able to get a decent picture of it, so under those rather pale circumstances it was my Bird of the Day.
At school we were taught to end an essay with a conclusion, here it is: I didn’t seen many birds and paid far too much for those that I did.

10 January 2014. Sosua, Dominican Republic. There must be a million stories about the Great January Freeze-up; mine is that I missed it. Instead I was on the sub-tropical island of Hispaniola, investigating opportunities for Rotary to finance a sewage system which will be the starting point for a much improved standard of living for a community now living in conditions that can be described as medieval at best.
Hispaniola is a beautiful island with a nasty history of slavery and sugar, and while you’d like to think the worst of all of that is forgotten and forgiven, uncountable thousands continue to live in shocking conditions.
So although my days are taken up with Rotary ‘business’ (and what better time of year to be doing this) there are always birds around somewhere; binoculars and field guides are must-pack items for me.
Frankly I haven’t seen very many species. Staying at an all-inclusive resort doesn’t leave much room for wildlife and when I’m not there I’m visiting villages where conditions and our agenda don’t allow for much relaxation. Still, all of that aside I’ve been looking.
Northern Mockingbirds and White-winged Doves are common almost everywhere. Antillian Palm Swifts fly in busy insect-chasing swarms but only it seems in the early morning or evening – or just after a rain. one evening, sitting on my balcony trying not to notice the extraordinarily repetitive selection of latin dance music from the all-you-can-drink/swallow/drain bar below, I caught movement in the tops of a tree close by. Binoculars always ready I found a pair of Hispaniolan Woodpeckers, they are closely related to our familiar Red-bellied Woodpecker. I had seen one earlier and even managed to get a photograph although it worked hard to stay on the wrong side of the palm tree.
I see Turkey Vultures wheeling around although not very many, which seems out of character for a bird that’s so ubiquitous throughout the Americas. And then there are Bananaquits, cute little finch-like birds that seem to play the role of chickadee, inquisitive and sometimes endearing.
Bird of the Day every day is the Grey Kingbird. It’s a close relative to our familiar Eastern Kingbird and the Tropical Kingbird that I enjoyed a year ago in Mexico. These birds, all of them, leave no doubt who’s in charge. The Grey Kingbirds here fly around from pillar to post asserting their dominance chittering loudly as they go. Funny how the sun-worshipers don’t seem to care all that much.

3 January 2013 Hamilton Harbour.  It was definitely cold today.  It didn’t matter much whether you live by the Fahrenheit or Celsius scale, it was bitterly cold either way.  But the sun shone brightly and I felt a need to get out and see how birds in general and waterfowl in particular are responding.  I suspect that many passerines and perhaps hawks too, succumbed to the intense ice storm of two weeks ago.  With all plants encased in ice and the ground sealed with a layer of ice-capped snow, food of all kinds would have been very hard to reach.  We’ll probably never know the extent of the mortality.  Waterfowl though may do better as long as there’s open water to swim in and, one hopes, food within reach or a quick dive away.

My first stop was at the shipping canal that links our harbour with the open waters of Lake Ontario. The canal is deep and the water within it heaves and surges in response to the mood and thrusts of the lake.  The canal is evidently a food-rich place as there are often hundreds of wintering Long-tailed Ducks, Lesser and Greater Scaup, and Common Goldeneye to be found there.  Today with the harbour largely frozen over and the lake clogged with plates of drifting ice, the canal was a refuge for large rafts of the above species and more besides.  I didn’t stay long though, because even though I was well dressed for the cold, the cutting wind very quickly chilled me to the bone.

Admiring a group of ducks and swans milling around in a different and sheltered area of open water, I was excited and surprised to hear and see a Belted Kingfisher.  It was working the edge of the harbour and perched for a minute or two, watching the ducks to see if there was anything worth waiting around for.  It was undoubtedly Bird of the Day, but I hope it survives because I think its presence may be an indicator of how desperate conditions have become as reliable fishing spots freeze over.

Had I not seen the kingfisher my vote for today would have gone to a handsome Hooded Merganser who was paddling just offshore.  I’m sure it would much rather have put more distance between us, but with the ice closing in there wasn’t much choice.