Ahhhh, it feels like Fall!

I had a little bit of time this morning to go to Rosetta McClain Gardens because the much anticipated Northwest winds were due to arrive, and with them large numbers of migratory raptors!

There was quite a large group at the park and the birds were flying through quite quickly.  First, some gorgeous shots of the lake and clouds, and don't forget, you can double click on any shot to enlarge:

And in this next one you can see the mist from Niagara Falls, next to the Skylon:

Blue Jay on a bench:

 

Sharp-shinned hawk

Broad-winged hawk:

Totally crappy picture but an eagle is an eagle is an eagle.  This one was in the Markham/Kingston Road area but never made it's way to the Watch.  I saw 3 while walking dogs today and this was the closest. It was low when furthest from me and climbed higher as it approached:

Eagle with gull:

Back to the watch for a third time, and we saw a rainbow.  It started off over the edge of the bluffs where the poplar (RIP) used to be, then travelled across the lake:

And the Northern Cardinal who comes for peanuts showed up late in the day:

Bruce, Walter and I were the last ones there and we left just before the snow flew (okay, maybe not but it was REALLY cold!)

A few treats from Rosetta McClain Gardens

I love this time of year, especially since I've become a part of the Rosetta McClain Gardens Raptor Watch.  For those who don't know what a Raptor Watch is, there are a number of them along migratory routes on the shores of Lake Ontario and Lake Erie and more.  People count migrating birds of prey between August and December, and for the official Raptor Watches, data is compiled annually on the number of birds that are counted.  Does it sound boring or strange?  I'm pretty sure a lot of people think we're nuts!  However, when you get hooked, you're hooked for life and we get a charge out of spotting birds of prey when they're tiny dots in the sky or when a Bald Eagle flies past us at eye level! And yes, it's true, we DO see eagles in the sky over Toronto, they don't nest here (yet!) but they have made a remarkable comeback after being endangered for a long time.

I hadn't been down to the park much during the day but had been going in the late afternoon.  A couple of weeks ago I was driving towards the park when I saw a big, dark bird circling low near Kingston Road and Warden Avenue.  Whenever it circled at an angle I would see the flashes of white head and tail and knew it was an adult bald eagle!  I went towards the area it had been in and was happy to see it was still circling while climbing higher and higher until it was up by the clouds.  It migrated along the shoreline and out of sight soon after.

A couple of days later I was with my friend Gord at Rosetta and we saw another adult fly by us and 20 minutes later a juvenile went past.  Neither of us had a camera but we were glad to have seen them, regardless.

This past weekend I did have my camera with me (and I will remind you all that my lens is nothing more than an all purpose lens and is not good for photographing birds in flight) when another eagle went by.  This was a sneaky eagle; we generally see them in the distance and watch them as they get closer but somehow this one got past us but was kind enough to circle so we could oooooo and ahhhhh over it.

You can see a gull below it, that gives you an idea of how big eagles are!

The white tail feathers show that this eagle wasn't born this year and although I'm not sure how old it is, I would say it's a second or third year, making it either 1.5 or 2.5 years of age.  Eagles are considered to be adults at 5 years of age when the head and tail are fully white.  In this picture you can't see any white:

Today, we had another surprise, a Northern Goshawk.  We normally see these later in the season so it was pretty cool:

And last but not least, I saw a very busy spider on my way back to the car:

It was a fun few days because even when the birds aren't showing up in huge numbers, whatever we do see is appreciated.  The camaraderie amongst the birders keeps us laughing and the excitement of seeing special birds is always fun.  

Death of a tree

These are two pictures of the area where the most damage at Rosetta happened. The tree that went over the edge was really big so it's no wonder how much land it took with it. You can see it clearly in the top picture, which I took in December/10, and in the picture below on March 21/11 it was long gone.

When we have the raptor watch in the fall we always joke about how a lot of the trees get in the way and seem to make birds disappear, but when they're gone you really miss them. I think the tree that went over was a poplar.

Just realized I had a similar picture of the leaning tree from early January/11:

And from today:

Erosion after the storm

I made a quick trip to Rosetta McClain Gardens this morning and ran into Frank, Nancy and Pat. Spring fever, anyone?

We didn't see any birds but Pat and Nancy showed me part of the bluffs that eroded over the past couple of days and took a bunch of trees with it. Every time we get a lot of rain this happens, and they're going to have to move the fence in soon.

This tree is leaning on more of an angle now than it was a few weeks ago:

This is what happened over on the east side of the park. A huge chunk fell over and the fence is now right on the edge of the bluffs:

The only good news was we saw and heard male red-winged blackbirds so as far as I'm concerned, spring is on its way!