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Paletta Park, Burlington, ON. May 14 2020.  This was a morning we’d been waiting for, finally a day not dominated by Arctic weather, finally a day to meet some southern migrants. Those migrants were perhaps more desperate to be here than we were to see them, they’ve been on their way north for weeks from tropical spots like El Salvador, Panama, Columbia and even Brazil, they have a breeding agenda, an appointment to keep with the future.

Our eight-strong warbler tally was Black-throated Blue, Black and White, Black-throated Green, Nashville, Chestnut-sided and Blue-winged Warblers, Northern Parula, and Northern Waterthrush, not bad. The last four were new to me this year.

It’s not all about warblers though, and I was more taken by a Great-crested Flycatcher than anything else, it was my Bird of the Day on a day most will remember for the warblers. It’s one of those birds with attitude, self-assured and a touch pugnacious.  Later, after all this migration fuss is over, I’ll probably encounter Great-crested Flycatchers again in their wet-woodland territory. They really like soggy, mosquito-marshy clearings in deciduous forests, places with plenty of dead and dying trees, any of which might have a suitable hole for a nest site.

Above is a shot of today’s bird but the light was difficult and the cedar branches don’t help. Below are photos from other days that do justice to the subtle beauty of this creature, that lovely chestnut in the tail and wings and the sulphur yellow breast.

Waterdown ON. May 8 2020. It was an unusual morning of birding for a couple of reasons. I blame the weather for part of it, we are being swept by a strong system bringing Arctic air and snow flurries (!). It is likely to cause considerable mortality among the many insectivorous birds newly arrived from the south. But it’s not unprecedented as you’ll see if you review my post of May 15, 2016.  

 My warbler-hopeful spots were as quiet as I’d expected, which is to say deadly. I found large aggregations of Barn Swallows and Tree Swallows gathered on lakeside trees, hoping, I suppose, to pick hatching insects from the lake’s surface. They were a disconsolate sight, interesting but a bit saddening to watch. I stayed for a while but it was too cold to spend very long there so I decided to explore a couple of rural back-roads in an effort to fill some gaps in the map I carry in my head.

I was not surprised to meet up with a small group of Wild Turkeys, but was very surprised to meet a Ruffed Grouse. It was an encounter reminiscent of my Golden Pheasant incident some years ago, it may help in your appreciation of today’s meeting if you will take a look at that Golden Pheasant story first.  

It was on a very quiet, dead-end road, a rural backwater. I had pulled aside to listen carefully for any sounds from that group of turkeys when I saw a small movement near the edge on the other side of the road. It looked like a Ruffed Grouse taking off into the tangled undergrowth. I couldn’t be sure, so I silenced the car and all of its associated noise and got out to investigate. To my surprise that bird, now certainly a Ruffed Grouse, came back up from the ditch and walked purposefully towards me as if it was a pet expecting a handout. There may well be some truth in that, for there were a couple of houses within a couple of hundred meters or so, perhaps someone had hand-reared it; it certainly identified me as a friend not a foe. I took several pictures with my iPhone and after a few minutes went to leave; astonishingly it followed me to the car!

Now I was really intrigued and turned back to approach it again, carefully and closer, until I was able to pick it up. It didn’t care for that so I opened my hands to let it go and, rather than fly, it fluttered back down, it had no fear of me. Something is very wrong with this picture, almost as wrong as that Golden Pheasant eight years ago. If it makes a difference, they’re in the same family of birds, phasianidae.

Ruffed Grouse are birds of upland forests with plenty of undergrowth for cover. Their plumage is cryptically patterned to make them all but invisible, it almost vanishes in the photo below. This meet-up was a once in a lifetime opportunity for me to appreciate that rich deliberate perfection. See what you think. My Bird of the Day of course.

Burlington ON. May 6 2020. Northern Rough-winged Swallows are not particularly notable sighting around here, but perhaps they deserve a bit more attention. I found a pair today who had moved in to set up home in a newly-exposed cliff face.

A couple of things about Northern Rough-winged Swallows:  They are a drab looking bird certainly the least visually attractive among our swallow species, the competition is overwhelming: Barn Swallows, Tree Swallows and Cliff Swallows, all are handsome birds (See a couple of them below). It’s also interesting, I think, to consider that unusual name, Rough-winged: it refers to a unique characteristic of their primary feathers. The barbs of the leading edge of outer primaries of adult males are recurved into small hooklets, or in the case of females tiny points. So, should you have one of these birds in your hand you’d find that the edge of the wing has a file-like roughness, rough-winged actually.  No -one seem to know why this should be.

What made today’s birds a little bit more intriguing is that they have appropriated this exposed cliff face as the ideal spot to excavate a nesting burrow. The cliff face was exposed by a landslide that ripped a chunk out of a steep valley edge. I’ve been intrigued for a while by the nature of the landslide and its various impacts and was checking to see how plants and the valley in general were adjusting and adapting.

According to Aristotle, Nature abhors a vacuum, so this pair of Northern Rough-winged Swallows is apparently nature at work and that makes them My Birds of the Day.  I look forward to seeing which plant species will gain a toehold on the new terrain in the growing season ahead.

Paletta Park, Burlington, ON. May 4 2020.  It all looked right for a big birding day so I left the house early to revisit this prime spot. In my haste I was a bit under-dressed for the brisk north wind and several times wondered if I should go home and get another layer on. But of course, I couldn’t possibly leave with so much going on, the White Cedar hedge was hopping with little birds. The hedge is old and unkempt and, as a consequence, full of insects and other invertebrates, just the sort of place for overnight migrants to refuel.

Just as yesterday, there were many Yellow–rumped Warblers, and I mean many, dozens and dozens, almost all boldly coloured males and just a couple of females. There were many Black-throated Green Warblers and Palm Warblers too and I noticed that they both appeared to prefer the extremities of branches in their foraging unlike the Yellow-rumped who tended to work deeper in the dark inner reaches.

One beautiful male Black-throated Blue Warbler , and only one, appeared for a while, but I loved it! It might be First Prize among warbler species, certainly it was today (and Bird of the Day) but ask me another time and well, anything could happen, there are many more beauties to come. He moved too quickly for me to get a photo but I have other shots from earlier years, here’s one.

It just so happens that it graces the page for the current month of the Bird Studies Canada calendar.

There was more to the morning than warblers though (although you might find that hard to believe). A small group of Blue-gray Gnatcatchers, a Hermit Thrush, two Blue–headed Vireos and a close Warbling Vireo all kept the chill away.

Paletta park, Burlington, ON. May 3 2020.  This will not take long. It was a glorious morning under a clear blue sky, it was warm and I was one of a group of happy hopefuls searching an overgrown bank of White Cedars for a warbler or two. They are arriving we know that, we just needed to spot them.

We soon found a couple of Palm Warblers, then a Blue–headed Vireo and a Ruby–crowned Kinglet both of which were hard to follow as they foraged deep in the old cedars. Behind us we heard a Warbling Vireo (but never did see it) and a Gray Catbird mewed softly and made us all turn around. Eventually the small crowd dispersed, I was alone when a Yellow–rumped Warbler emerged right in front of me. I made a small kissing sound and he stopped to investigate.

I was able to get a few photos today: the Yellow-rumped Warbler at the masthead, this one here and one of our Palm Warblers below.

Yellow-rumped Warblers are not uncommon, they leave us to our own devices through the winter months but come back as soon as they can at the end of April or early May; they are a sort of gatekeeper to the imminent return of more exotic warblers. For their unselfish service to winter-weary birders Yellow-rumped Warbler was my Bird of the Day.