After finding the Purple Sandpiper on Wednesday last week, I was still in search of the Harlequin Duck. At least I only had to wait a day to locate this rare visitor to Southern Ontario. I started the day in the west end of the city, looking for Purple Finches. These birds, other than one viewing in Newfoundland last year, are my present nemesis species. I see plenty of postings of Purple Finch sightings on e-bird, but never seem to be able to find them.
I began my search in Rhododendron Park where I found neither Rhododendrons or Purple Finches. I did, however get a nice look at a Greater Black-backed Gull and yet another Brown Creeper. It was a beautiful, sunny and not too cool morning and after finding every species but a Purple Finch, I headed over to Riverwood Conservancy to continue my search. In vain, as it turned out. But not before I found a particularly photogenic Red-tailed Hawk.
I decided to give up on searching for Purple Finches, in hopes that if I am not looking for them, one will land, sometime when I am not looking, on the tip of my nose. It seems that way with the Brown Creepers I keep seeing. So I headed back east to Colonel Samuel Smith Park to search for the Harlequin Duck again. Harlequins spend most of the summer in western Canada, Alaska and Northern Quebec. They winter along both the pacific and Atlantic coasts and occasionally stop by along the Great Lakes in Ontario. Very rarely do we get one down in Col. Sam, so it was a good opportunity to add a second park rarity in a week.
I actually couldn't see it from Col. Sam so headed over to Rotary Park across the bay, where Sue had seen it a few days earlier, and pretty much in the same spot found it bobbing up and down in the surf, all by itself. It wasn't close enough for my 300mm, lens to get a great shot, and it had its back turned to me, but I was able to get a good look through my binoculars.
Saturday I birded again around Col. Sam and was rewarded with another look at the Harlequin and the first American Wigeon I've seen this year in the park. I think I'll start a Col. Sam list, since I bird there more than any other location in Toronto, and that includes James Gardens, which is just down the street from me.
This Sunday morning was a chase of a different sort. Wild Goose, to be exact. Though not rare in Alaska in the Summer,(I saw many in June of 2012), and a fall migrant through the west and Midwest, a Greater White-fronted Goose in southern Ontario is cause for a chase. David, one of my birding buddies and a friend spotted 4 of them this morning in a lake in the small village of Hillsburgh, an hour north and west of my Etobicoke home. I decided, after breakfast, to go and chase it. Halfway there I learnt that it had flown south shortly before I set out to find it. No matter, I continued on anyway in hopes it would return to the lake after a good lunch in a cornfield, say.
When arrived at the lake there were a few birders present, but no goose. Well, there were geese, hundreds of Canada Geese, but none of White-fronted variety. I hung around for a while, then decided to go off in search of the geese in other bodies of water in the area and see what other birds I might spy. I didn't find a recently seen Northern Shrike, but did find a pond with about a dozen Trumpeter and Tundra Swans. I stopped by the lake again and ran into Albert, whom I have run into a number of times in a few different birding hot spots over the last two years. He's chased this bird in Ontario a number of times without finding it, and wasn't going to leave today until he saw the bird or darkness descended upon him.
He had missed the one in Whitby Harbour I had seen in February of 2012, but had seen many of them outside Ontario. I hung out for an hour and we chatted and swapped birding tales. Around 1:30 I decided to run out and get some lunch and check a few other nearby locations for the geese. I should have stayed another 10 minutes, because around 1:40 the birds swooped in. Two other birders had returned to catch the arrival while I was running the roads in search of a sandwich and coffee. I actually did find a wonderful little bakery cafe where they made me a nice ham and cheese to go, which I ate in the car on my way back to the pond.
And when I returned, I was greeted with the news that the goose chase was over and the Greater White-fronted Geese were indeed in the pond. It took a few moments to locate them in my scope, but, yes indeed, there they were. Compared to our Canada Geese, these birds are veritable runway models, with their orange beaks and svelt brown plumage. Albert, Helena, Elias and I watched them for about an hour, reported them on OntBirds, and eventually packed up our cameras and scopes and headed out, hoping others who came behind us were also able to get a look at yet another rare visitor to Ontario.
Tomorrow, perhaps, if the weather is good, I shall head to Fort Erie yet again. This time the hunt will be for a Common Eider and perhaps a look at the still present Franklin's Gull, both of which, though not lifers, would add to my slowly growning Ontario List. And, if time allows this week and the bird is still present, off to Quebec on a seven hour chase for a Ross's Gull. That would be a Lifer.
Perhaps...
And Here, now the Greater White-fronted Geese, along with photos from earlier in the week:
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