Yesterday (Oct 8) at lunch time I saw a very late Indigo Bunting in Britannia woods. Sibley shows the basic plumage of male Indigo and Lazuli buntings as being much like their alternate plumage, only dingier, so I originally concluded this was a female. Other sources, consulted later, suggest male basic plumage is like female plumage. I gathered from one source, though, that the moult back to alternate plumage is very protracted, so appearance during non-breeding season changes. Since there was a certain amount of blue, I now conclude my bird was a male. Because Ottawa had its first ever Lazuli Bunting last year, I considered this possibility but nothing about the bird really suggested this species over Indigo.
There was an Orange-crowned Warbler and a Lincoln's Sparrow in the same general area as the bunting. Today (Oct 9) there were a couple of rusty blackbirds on the shore of Mud Lake in Britannia. Yesterday morning I was in Clyde Ave woods, spending a rather frustrating time trying to catch up with a very uncooperative owl, probably a long-eared. Despite my attempted stealth, I flushed him twice, getting only fleeting looks each time. After that, I didn't see him again. Fortunately there were quite a few other birds in the woods: another orange-crowned warbler, several hermit thrushes and a couple of Swainson's, a sapsucker of each sex, 5 species of sparrow including my first Tree of the fall and, surprisingly to me, a rusty blackbird. At one point a Cooper's Hawk (from the size presumably a female) soared overhead, with a crow harassing her. This morning (Oct 9) I checked these woods again, but found no owl, and indeed very few birds. Visits to Scrivens, Ottawa Beach and Shirley's Bay yesterday were not particularly productive, but a Swamp Sparrow at the last location allowed me a rare (for me) Melospiza sweep. In all over the past 2 days I had 8 species of warbler, including the aforementioned orange-crowned, parula, a female yellowthroat, palm and 3 black-throated blues (2 of them female), the last a species I haven't seen much this fall. I saw 3 winter wrens yesterday, each in a different location. Sorry that the above is a bit muddled as to dates (yesterday and today). My original posting yesterday did not work. Paul Matthews, Ottawa From [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sun Oct 9 16:51:45 2005 Return-Path: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Delivered-To: [email protected] Received: from m7.nyc.untd.com (m7.nyc.untd.com [64.136.22.70]) by king.hwcn.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 22A7463AB1 for <[email protected]>; Sun, 9 Oct 2005 16:51:45 -0400 (EDT) Received: from m7.nyc.untd.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by m7.nyc.untd.com with SMTP id AABBWVA5XAXF3VNJ for <[email protected]> (sender <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>); Sun, 9 Oct 2005 13:54:13 -0700 (PDT) Received: (from [EMAIL PROTECTED]) by m7.nyc.untd.com (jqueuemail) id K6V9LTY2; Sun, 09 Oct 2005 13:53:22 PDT To: [email protected] Date: Sun, 9 Oct 2005 16:51:33 -0400 Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> X-Mailer: Juno 4.0.11 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Juno-Line-Breaks: 1-2,5-6,8-11,14-18 X-Juno-Att: 0 X-Juno-RefParts: 0 From: Alan Wormington <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> X-ContentStamp: 4:6:1894499343 X-UNTD-OriginStamp: +I4zx4PQdguu3tHbbJmampkQxbeqqsP/KZQ+aB4WSaZxU1trjDDLJw=X-UNTD-Peer-Info: 127.0.0.1|localhost|m7.nyc.untd.com|[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [Ontbirds].Did anyone else see the Black Vulture? X-BeenThere: [email protected] X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list X-List-Received-Date: Sun, 09 Oct 2005 20:51:45 -0000 I'm posting this only because it would be nice to determine the flight speeds of various raptors migrating along the north shore of Lake Erie. Today I had a two birds at Seacliff (SE Leamington) that I hope are also seen today at Holiday Beach and / or Detroit Metropark, which will provide some good flight info. Guinea Pig #1 was a BLACK VULTURE that passed at 11:05 a.m., in with a flock of about 130 Turkey Vultures. Guinea Pig #2 was a juvenile Golden Eagle that passed at 12:30 p.m. My tally for Turkey Vulture today (7 hours) was 7110 birds. This is more than DOUBLE the previous all-time count for Point Pelee -- 3470 on October 21, 2004 at Seacliff (5 hours). Alan Wormington, Leamington
