Hello birders. I spent yet another day trying to catch some of these gulls
wandering over to the Canadian side of the river and was somewhat successful in
the later afternoon.
At the north end of Squaw Is. the Bonaparte's Gulls were present in the
thousands once again and amongst them I picked out the Black-headed Gull and an
adult Little Gull on the American side of the river and after a concerted
effort saw the 1st-winter Black-legged Kittiwake and a 1st-winter Little Gull
floating on the water in a raft of bonies mid-river (and more importantly, ON
the Canadian side).
Along the stretch of the Niagara River Parkway between the Peace Bridge and the
north of Squaw Island I found a hybrid Common Goldeneye x Hooded Merganser. It
appeared very similar to this photo I found on Flickr by using Google images.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rjm284/4409395143/in/photostream/ Differences
were less whitish feathers in the face, a more rounded head in the front (but
still the obvious feather peak towards the back of the head), and a more Hooded
Merganser-like bill (thinner and longer than the photo I found but still not
quite perfect for a Hooded Merganser. It was a very cool bird that spent most
of it's time diving with a group of Common Goldeneye and Red-breasted
Mergansers. Interestingly, Mike Runtz just reported this type of hybrid from
Cobourg a few days back.
Fish Crows: I bumped in to Geoff Carpenter and his friend Peter while looking
at the gulls off Squaw Is. At around 3:30 p.m. American Crows started arriving
in the neighbourhood around Bowen Rd. and the Niagara River Parkway. There are
plenty of places to park here and lots of sidewalks and pavement to walk around
in search of crows here. I heard a couple Fish Crows calling almost
immediately upon entering the area of gathered crows and called Geoff and Peter
over by phone. All three of us got to hear and see these birds quite well
including in-flight side-by-side views with American Crows. There were no less
than 5 Fish Crows calling among a hundred Americans and given that thousands
more crows would have come through there by the time 5 p.m. would roll around I
suspect there are a few more (perhaps many more?) to be found still. I do not
think that those who try will have a difficult time finding this species. This
clearly is a new phenomena in Ontario Birding. Never have Fish Crows been
twitchable before! Good luck to those who try.
P.S. I have much better video and sound of the calling Fish Crows than Josh and
I were able to obtain a couple weeks ago. I will try and get it posted online
somewhere when I get a chance (but not tonight!).
Directions: All of these areas are reached by taking the Niagara River Parkway
north from Fort Erie. This whole stretch that I have talked about is no more
than 2 k.m. long.
Cheers,
Andrew Keaveney
Field Biologist/Ornithologist, Bird and Wildlife Guide
647-383-8894 (cell)
"When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of
the world"
~ John Muir
"Live, eat, breathe birds"
~ Twitcher
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