Ramblings of a Wildflower: January 2016

Saturday, January 23, 2016

Petroglyphs Provincial Park - A Winter Wonderland

Last weekend, it was one of my friend's birthdays and as an avid hiker she suggested that we all go for a winter hike out at Petroglyphs Provincial Park.

It was my very first time visiting this beautiful place. Over the last two years in Peterborough, I have been planning to make it out here, but just never got up to it. While we didn't get to see the actual Petroglyphs (apparently they are in a building now! And that building is closed for the winter) we did do about three hours of hiking through the back trails. Boy, was it ever a winter wonderland.

While I don't remember the names of the exact trails we hiked on, I believe we cut across the West Day Use Trail and then took the Marsh Trail. We hiked through valleys, up hills, around frozen marshlands, through tall beautiful forests, around shrubby areas, over bubbling creeks, it was beautiful. There was a really nice snowfall the night before our hike too, while made all the trees look almost magical, everyone had a dusting of snow.

The walk was amazing and there were even quite a few birds out on the trails too! Chickadees, Dark-eyed Juncos, and Red- and White-breasted Nuthatches were everywhere we went. There were a few year firsts for me such as Brown Creeper and Common Raven. Common Redpolls were also very common flying in flocks over the tree tops, these were also the first ones I have seen this year. The most exciting bird was a lifer for me!

My first lifer of 2016 is officially the Red Crossbill. They were in fairly large flocks floating above the tree tops. I snapped a quick photo of them flying, it is likely one of my worst photos ever too! We happened to come across them when we were stopped for a quick water break. We heard bird sounds from up in the tree and assumed that it was more Redpolls. However, they sounded just a wee bit different. Since they were so high up in the pines it was really difficult to get a good look. We saw hint of yellow and thought maybe a Cedar Waxwing? But then they looked like a finch body shape....so maybe Evening Grosbeaks? We listened a bit more and took out our sound apps to see if we could match the sound. Suddenly, Crossbills came to our mind. After looking their sound up....it was a match! Then looking up photos in the field guide, these all matched as well. Finch-like beak, slender body, larger size, yellow (for females or immature males) colour, some also a orangey colour (for adult males).

If anyone is in the Peterborough-Kawartha's region and in need of an amazing winter hike. I would definitely suggest heading out for a hike at Petroglyphs! You can learn more about the park by visiting their website.

Happy Naturing!

Sunday, January 17, 2016

Greater or Less than...Little Lake Visit

Last weekend I went on my first birding outing of the year. I only wanted to take a hour or two break from work, so I went off to Little Lake in Peterborough to see some gulls and waterfowl.

It was a fairly quiet afternoon! The Lesser Black-backed Gull that had been reported earlier in the week was no longer there, instead all I could see was a raft of ice full of Ring-billed Gulls. Chickadees did not make a single peep, nor were there any woodpeckers. It's always just a tiny bit eerie when even birds aren't making any noise!

There were four species of waterfowl out on the water that day. Mallards, Common Goldeneye, Common Merganser, and then a Greater Scaup, although at the time it was just Scaup sp.

Common Goldeneye

Common Merganser

Greater Scaup

Scaup are always a tricky species for any kind of birder to tell apart from Lesser or Greater. When in a large flock, I've always been able to figure out which are which, especially because they do look very different when together! However, when they are in singles it really is difficult!

I posted the following screenshot of one of my silhouette photos to the Facebook site "Ontario Birds". A number of friends are on this site and they, along with the other members, are always so great and so keen to help out with Bird ID. After posting the photo I got a number of tips and tricks to identifying the two different kinds of Scaup. Tips such as: peak at the front of the head, overall a fairly rounded head, larger in size all lead to the identification of a female Greater Scaup.

And then from the Little Lake cemetery we departed to go back home with only one more stop. It was still strange only having about 8 or so species on our list, especially in an area that is usually a little more lively, in terms of birds.

Mike and I then stopped at two locations on the way home to feed some hungry Mallards! We had stopped at TSC earlier in the day to buy some cracked corn and now stopped at a spot on Little Lake, and then again at the boat launch off Monaghan Road.

The boat launch was the place with definitely the most activity. We threw out a little bit of corn for the few ducks closest to us and within a minute we were swarmed with quacking, hungry mouths. It was a super nice Sunday afternoon break!

Tuesday, January 5, 2016

2015 - A Natural Reflection and Year List

Blogging for me has always been as much about sharing nature with others as it has been about personal reflection. I have never written a year-end post before, however after learning about NCC's Creative Conservation Challenge, I was intrigued and motivated to write one!

For me, 2015 was an amazing year for birds. I explored so many new wildlife spots around the Peterborough, Ontario area, was out every single day in the summer doing field work for my Master’s degree, and even squeezed in a little bit of bird banding. It was a year full of hard work, very tiring days, and great opportunities.

I saw a total of 190 different species of birds in 2015 (see below for the complete list). My first species of the year was a Black Vulture on the drive back to Ontario from Nashville on New Year’s Day, and my last species of the year was a Vermilion Flycatcher in Wallaceburg, Ontario

A highlight of the year was adding 9 species of birds I had never seen before to my “lifer” list: Glaucous Gull, Iceland Gull, Thayer's Gull, Lesser Black-backed Gull, Vermilion Flycatcher, White-faced Ibis, Whimbrel, Red-throated Loon and Purple Sandpiper. A final lifer was a Least Bittern, but it was found as road kill. In this instance, I consider it an "on the fence" lifer. While I am a bird nerd, I also love herpetology. I was ecstatic to also add Yellow- and Blue-spotted Salamanders, as well as my very first Red-bellied Snake to my “lifer” list.

What natural areas were you able to explore for the first time?
For the first time, I explored Presqu'ile Provincial Park, Warsaw Caves and Darlington Provincial Park, three places that had been so close and yet I hadn't put the time into exploring. I would recommend a visit to Warsaw Caves to anyone wanting a really cool landscape, and Presqu’ile for waterfowl and shorebirds.

What three things did I do this year that helped the natural world? While I try to help the natural world through field work volunteering, much of what I do comes down fostering a love of the outdoors and natural world in other people. Here are some highlights from 2015:

Teaching a local Peterborough Grade 3/4 class about birding: Through updates from the teacher, twitter, and going to see their final projects, I was able to watch interest grow amongst these young kids and the natural world around them. Their "Big Month" challenge was met with eagerness and even their parents got in on the excitement.

TAing for an Ornithology Class: This year I had the pleasure of being a Teaching Assistant for Trent University's Introduction to Ornithology class. This had me out with students every Thursday morning, teaching them to ID by sight and sound, and trying to get them interested through fun and weird facts, tricks to remembering bird songs and names, etc. It has been very satisfying to look back on positive student course evaluations, especially when students say that the course encouraged them to pursue birding and wildlife conservation as a hobby or a career (or both!)

Master’s Field Work: I really hope that the work I have done through two field seasons working with bank swallows will be beneficial from a conservation standpoint. During this work, I met and spoke with several gravel operators, landowners and locals about the bank swallows that live and feed on their properties. Everyone responded with enthusiasm, asked plenty of questions, and often shared their own personal nature stories with me. Since we visited our sites so frequently, I ran into these people multiple times, and sure enough they would remember “the bird girl”. They enjoyed telling me new stories about bank swallows and other birds they saw, often showing me photos so I could help them ID birds (especially within a retirement community near one of my field sites). One of the things I love most about this line of work is that it’s not just a job or a hobby; it’s an entire community that often includes people who don’t even realize they are part of it.

Now for the fun part! I’ve put together my total bird list for the year with some of my favourite species photos from 2015! They are listed in the order that I saw each species throughout the year. I can’t wait to see what my 2016 list will look like!

Cheers to an amazing and birdy 2016!

Total 2015 Year Bird List: