Sunday 18 December 2011

Updates

Its been a while since I've posted, and I don't really have any updates. I finally wrote my last exam on Friday, spent the rest of Friday and yesterday cleaning my car/oil change/cleaning my house/running errands/making the house presentable for Laura's visit. Yesterday however, I got out for a bit of birding in the morning with budding birder Chris Law, before picking up Laura from the airport. I hadn't seen her since early September, so as you can imagine not too much of anything birding or blog related was done.

So yeah, yesterday's birding. Chris is a good buddy of mine, and he's one of the herp guys. He was the guy who went to the Smoky Mountains recently with me to chase salamanders! Remember this?




Chris has been turning into a well rounded naturalist lately and has been learning his birds, though he still won't admit he is a birder! We did a brief tour of the southern part of Wellington County with a few highlights. On December 17 in Wellington County one does not expect much of anything, let alone waterfowl so finding some Ring-necked Ducks among other things were nice. A Horned Grebe was a bit of a surprise at McNally Pit, but best of the day was an Evening Grosbeak flying around near Mountsburg, loosely associating with some Pine Siskins and goldfinches. Despite not seeing any raptors and, other than the finches, any passerines of interest we still had fun and it was nice to get out.

Unfortunately I can't do any CBC's this year due to various reasons but I will have most of Tuesday to do some birding as Laura is meeting up with some friends in Hamilton. Perhaps the Black-throated Gray will given an encore performance and I'll be ready with my camera this time!

I should be around until December 28th, at which point I head to Nova Scotia for about 9 days. Then, the big year is ON!!!!!! Current rarities that I am keeping an eye on that I will definitely chase within 2 days of being back (if they still hold) include:

Black-throated Gray Warbler
Slaty-backed Gull
Black Vultures - I haven't heard any recent reports though
Rufous Hummingbird

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