The 23rd St. Clair National Wildlife Area CBC was held on Saturday, January 4, 2003. Twenty-two observers recorded a total of 28761 individuals of 66 species. This is a bit lower than our previous 10 year average of almost 70 species, but a bit higher than our 23 year average of 63 species.
The weather was favourable, with temperatures slightly below freezing, cloudy bright conditions for most of the day and light to moderate westerly winds. Waterfowl are always important in obtaining high numbers for this count and with the early winter and almost totally frozen water conditions, both diversity and numbers were much lower than usual. Only 4920 individuals of 12 species were observed instead of the more typical 10,000+ individuals of 18 or more species (last year we had more than 30,000 individuals of 21 species). We reached new highs for the following species, with the previous high in brackets: Northern Shoveler 45 (32) Northern Harrier 25 (23) Sharp-shinned Hawk 9 (4) Cooper's Hawk 9 (8) Red-tailed Hawk 55 (51) Mourning Dove 2232 (1212) Eastern Phoebe-only the second record- 3 (1) Horned Lark 1137 (1107) Brown Creeper 7 (6) European Starling 12599 (9323) Dark-eyed Junco 467 (410) Northern Cardinal 339 (325) American Goldfinch 116 (75) Other highlights were our first ever Vesper Sparrow (with photo-thanks Alf!), bringing the cumulative 23 year total to 123 species. Also, we had our 2nd Northern Mockingbird, 5th record of Glaucous Gull, our 3rd highest number of Blue Jay (70), 4th record of Eastern Towhee, 5th highest total of American Tree Sparrow (1127), our 3rd ever Savannah Sparrow and 3rd highest total of Swamp Sparrow (149). Common Loon, Northern Pintail, Hooded Merganser, Red-shouldered Hawk and Northern Flicker were Count Week species. Among those species seen every year, were all-time low numbers for some species, including: Common Grackle (1) which has averaged 56 over 23 years Brown-headed Cowbird (27) which has averaged 869 over 23 years American Crow (366) which has averaged 33146 over the past 23 years, with an all time high of 159860 in 2000. Of course that was before the municipality of Chatham-Kent, with the involvement of Bird Control International undertook major dispersal tactics. That activity, plus the likelihood that crows in general are adapting to urban environments in winter has led to other CBCs in southern Ontario experiencing higher numbers of crows. But that is another story........ Allen Woodliffe Compiler [EMAIL PROTECTED]
