A few things happened this week.
- I made the decision to only stay home and my parents' place. Keep me from getting COVID and spreading it. This includes work so I have been working from a home set up, which has been good other than doing all of the forms I have to fill out with very little info and just pictures. (For those who don't know I am an Engineering Technologist so all of the bad parts go through me).
- All of the parks around me have closed. In Haldimand County the fines are up to $5,000 and I personally have better things to do with that money.
- My annual Point Pelee trip is cancelled and my trip to PEI in July is up in the air pending how long this epidemic takes hold.
- Banding at Ruthven has also been closed for the time being, unfortunate but necessary. I am definitely disappointed but it is for the best. This means all of the migrants I find will have to be on the private property my family owns.
That's all of the updates in the COVID-19 situation for right now. Even this being the case I still have my birding streak up (125 as of Sunday April 5th). I have been doing a lot of birding in the private property surrounding my family. This is a little view of what that has been.
The weekdays were pretty much the same but Friday was amazing! I seen 29 species including 2 Fox Sparrow and 22 Wood Duck. Should definitely look at putting more boxes up for them since we only have the one. This was just amazing as I haven't been seeing too many ducks there last year but this year seems to be a turn around for ducks there, which is amazing news. Green-winged Teal and Blue-winged Teal have made many good appearances there as well which is just awesome to see with my lack of Green-wings being spotted last year. I've also seen lots of American Wigeon and American Black Duck back there and an almost inordinate amount of Bald Eagle (at least 1 almost every time I'm out there). This has definitely been nicer than having nothing!
After the wetlands on my way home I was driving past a known Short-eared Owl spot and found 3 of the individuals chasing one another around the field (this pulls my count up to 5 on the year). That was so amazing I have never witnessed that in my entire tenure as a birder and I will never forget it.
The weekend seen me go to Ruthven on Saturday where I picked up my first Eastern Towhee of the year. Nothing too exciting besides that but it was still nice to see my fellow Ruthven gang before the closure that afternoon. Grabbed a few good pictures of a Blue Jay and American Robin by the Fox Den Trail. Sunday I decided to put my blind back at the wetlands and keep it up. This is hoping I can possibly go back there before dark sometime and wait for the waterfowl and get some amazing shots without scaring the birds away. Fingers crossed!
Hoping all of you good health and especially good birding!
Weekly Totals:
Species: 50
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