March 14th 2025
| LOCATION: Burlington, ON | WEATHER: Chilly'ish start but warmed up later |
Spring is starting to materialize and with a few new birds showing up around the area. Today Tim & I headed to Burlington to check out a couple of spots that usually produce a few birds. First, though we dropped by Farmborough Downs where a couple of rarities have shown up ... a Eurasian Wigeon and a White fronted Goose. We could see the Wigeon way out there but no images. The two spots we tried in Burlington were La Salle Marina and Valley Inn with, as you see from the volume of images below, some decent success. Nothing too exciting but nice to see nonetheless.
Tip of the Day: Amongst other things, birds are incredibly sensitive to movement. To combat this, once you have found a good shooting spot, limit your movement, and only move around when necessary and when you do, move slowly and deliberately. Most birds also have colour vision, making them sensitive to bright lights and colours, so if possible wear natural earth tones.
March 11th - 13th 2025
| LOCATION: Kitchener & Cambridge | WEATHER: Sun & cloud and warmer |
Over the last few days there has been a few new spring migrants show up in around home (Kitchener), which I must admit has been a welcome site - I was getting fed up of only seeing Juncos and Tree Sparrows. These two species are still around, but seem to be in much less numbers that they were a week ago. I think the milder weather has got things moving a bit.
**As always .. click on any image to show full size. Also by hovering your cursor over any image will provide a title**
March 8th & 9th 2025
| LOCATION: North Dumfries & Brant County | WEATHER: Sun & Cloud .. and getting warmer |
Day1 - I had a quick run down the old faithful road (Paris Plains) that has lots of Horned Larks and one or two of them give me excellent poses.
Day2 - I headed out with good friend Tim, to check out that same road and also a few other side roads in the same general area, with some super success .. especially the Northern Shrike. The Shrike was surprisingly bold.
Day2 - I headed out with good friend Tim, to check out that same road and also a few other side roads in the same general area, with some super success .. especially the Northern Shrike. The Shrike was surprisingly bold.
March 2nd 2025
| LOCATION: Brant County & North Dumfries | WEATHER: Really cold, but mainly cloudy |
Met up with my great birding friend, Helen, to do a little local birding. We had a few targets .. some of whom we managed to get and some we did not. After a much needed early morning coffee we headed down to Paris Plains to see if any of the decent birds were sitting out in the open - targets along here were the Horned Larks and Snow Buntings. The Larks were reasonably cooperative, but the Snow Buntings, yet again were not !!
Another spot we tried gave us a nice surprise, as we came across a Northern Shrike. It was some distance away as we tried to edge closer it took off, so the shot we did manage was pretty distant
Last spot for the day was at Blair Bridge lookout, where we had hoped to see the recently reported Long-tailed Duck. He drifted past our spot, but unfortunately he kept his head tucked in while he had a snooze.
Another spot we tried gave us a nice surprise, as we came across a Northern Shrike. It was some distance away as we tried to edge closer it took off, so the shot we did manage was pretty distant
Last spot for the day was at Blair Bridge lookout, where we had hoped to see the recently reported Long-tailed Duck. He drifted past our spot, but unfortunately he kept his head tucked in while he had a snooze.
