» Toronto & GTA Birding Photography

With reports of Short-eared Owls cruising the meadows, we took a trip out there today in hopes of spotting one of these birds. But it was the Long-eared Owl that showed up.

The sun was (finally!) shinning so I decided to drop by east humber bay park after work today to see if anything was moving. Winter has settled in and the main pond was about 80% frozen over and the small river was solid ice. The only signs of anything other than ducks was that of a distant chickadee.

We hiked in and around Thickson’s Woods and explored the meadow in search of, well, birds! We did find a few including black capped chickadees, a few nuthatch’s, a red tailed hawk soaring over the meadow…

First time birding the Humber Arboretum area and I loved it! It has everything a birder could want, meadows, fields, brush, ponds, forests and of course the West Humber River.

Might be still a bit early for the owls, as I didn’t see any, but I did get up close and personal with an American Kestrel. In all I took about 30 photos of this kestrel and happy with the results.

We had perfect north west winds but it was slow going for the first hour or so, by 10:30 a.m. the birds started rolling in. Turkey Vultures, a few Goshawks, Sharp Shinned hawks, and plenty of Red Tailed Hawks on their migration rout along the shores of Lake Ontario.
We also watched black capped chickadees, golden crowned kinglets, finches and Leslie quickly Identified a small group of Redpoll’s (thanks Leslie!).

Windy & seriously overcast with intermittent rain, perfect for photography! Well, not really but what the heck, the camera gets a bit wet, no big deal right? My first visit to Alex Robertson Park in Pickering was great. This is a must see park and comes complete with wooded areas, meadows, wetlands, and sculptures! Yes, I sad sculptures.

Although today was not optimal for birding, off and on rain with very high gusting winds I still saw quite a bit for the short time I was there. The usual suspects like Canada geese, Mallards, but also watched four Great Blue Herons off in the distance, Long tail ducks, mergansers, and a host of other species of waterfowl.

I was surprised by the size of the reservoir, I was also surprised by the amount of ducks! There had to be 100 mallards floating about, plenty of Canada Geese, one Red Tailed Hawk and watched one lone Great Blue Heron fishing the north section of the reservoir.

Amazingly hot weather (record breaking temperatures) on Sunday & Monday, Tuesday was a blow out with rain all day. But I did get back to the Humber tonight for a few photos.